Abolition of the Wicked - Chapter 86

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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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#086

“You’re paying it all up front?”
“Given that you’ll succeed, isn’t there no need to meet twice?”
Though it was reassuring that someone had come seeking her services, the Bloodwind Four Lions were people Do Pyeong-su preferred not to encounter too often.
“Suits me fine. No bother at all.”
Only after the money changed hands did they discuss the commission itself.
“All you need do is escort someone from Shanxi Province to Namgung Mountain in Gansu Province.”
“A child? That sounds just like the commission Mi-na-chal and Cheon-eum-gwi handled before, the one where—”
“That’s the same child.”
“The one the Mudang Faction’s been trying to catch?”
“So I’ve been told.”
“Why?”
“The employer didn’t say, so neither do I. Rather than reveal the reason, they raised the fee. As for you, Mu-yeong-gwi—does it matter whether you know or not?”
“No need to kill anyone, I assume?”
“What? Is Mu-yeong-gwi averse to murder?”
“I’m working toward enlightenment.”
“Ah!”
Baek Dong-pal simply took it as a jest.
“Once you deliver the child to Namgung Mountain in Gansu Province, whether you paint the landscape with corpses or simply slip away—it’s entirely up to you, Mu-yeong-gwi.”
“Does the employer know who we are?”
“How could I possibly reveal the identities of the Bloodwind Four Lions? I value my own neck too much for that.”
“You’ve got some sense. Had you talked loosely, your tongue would’ve been ripped out. There was an old case like that, you see. Someone said that if you pull out the tongue, they’ll write with their hands, and if you cut off the hands, they’ll write with their toes, and some even said they could write with a brush stuck between their buttocks, and after that I… can’t quite remember what happened next.”
As Baek Dong-pal continued to dwell on these images, he shuddered violently and swore five separate oaths that he would never breathe a word.
‘Yeon Geum-hong just ran in a straight line, so that’s all I need to do.’
Completing the commission wouldn’t be difficult. The only inconvenience was carrying the child such a long distance.
“Exactly where in Shanxi Province is the child?”
After receiving detailed directions from Baek Dong-pal, Do Pyeong-su set out toward Shanxi Province.

***

Seo Seok-san never imagined that all those months spent wandering through Zhongyuan searching for his master Hwa-jeok-san would prove so useful.
In searching for Hwa-jeok-san, he’d picked up all manner of scattered intelligence—some of it concerning creatures that belonged in folklore and myth.
Most of it was nonsense: nine-tailed foxes, flying tigers, that sort of thing. But occasionally rumors reached him of genuine Spirit Beasts like the Blood Bear.
Information that once seemed utterly worthless now, when Spirit Medicine was needed, had become priceless—worth more than gold.
Particularly the Blood Bear’s Inner Core and gall bladder possessed such intense Yang properties that an ordinary person consuming them would have their organs melt away, leaving a shriveled husk.
And Seo Seok-san needed precisely such potent Yang medicines now—because Yeon Geum-hong had gone to obtain the Bing-jeong.
To counterbalance Bing-jeong, the most intensely Yin substance in existence, one required Spirit Medicines of extreme Yang properties: Thousand-Year Snow Ginseng, Thousand-Year Polygonum, or the Inner Core of a Blood Bear or Blood Tiger.
Spirit Beasts, unless circumstances were extraordinary, never abandoned a place once they’d established themselves. They chose their ground because the geomantic energy there harmonized with their own nature.
So if rumors spoke of Blood Bears and Blood Tigers dwelling in a certain location, they would still be there—unless killed or captured.
“Come! Buy now! Buy! Every purchase comes with another free!”
“It’s not every day we get medicine like this! Just try it once! Every night it throbs so much—!”
Market Day was chaos, the streets teeming with crowds. Seo Seok-san pushed through them toward Hunter Street.
Hunter Street earned its name because shops selling the catches of hunters lined the entire avenue.
As he drew closer, the reek of blood and animal musk grew overwhelming. More and more pedestrians wore clothes cut from tiger skin, until he found himself in a thoroughfare packed exclusively with hunters.
Seo Seok-san entered the largest restaurant in the middle of Hunter Street.
Groups of hunters with their equipment sat scattered about, chatting among themselves.
After surveying the room, Seo Seok-san approached a table where five middle-aged hunters sat and claimed a seat.
Hunters too old lacked vigor; those too young lacked experience. Middle-aged hunters with families needing support were ideal for negotiation.
The five hunters engaged in conversation turned their gaze toward Seo Seok-san.
“Who might you be?”
Seo Seok-san’s bearing, burdened as he was with a box roughly a foot square in each dimension, was entirely unlike that of a hunter.
“There’s a rumor that, not far from here at Cheon Seok Mountain, Blood Bears have appeared for more than a decade.”
The hunters’ mouths curled into sneers.
“You’re a Murim martial artist, it seems. I’d advise you not to walk toward your death. No shortage of martial artists have perished that way.”
The Blood Bear’s Inner Core and gall bladder weren’t actually superior Spirit Medicines for advancing one’s Martial Arts. Yet when consumed alongside medicines that matched their nature, those two items could be transformed in an instant into treasures worth a fortune.
“Don’t worry about my death—that’s my concern. You just find the Blood Bear. Once we have it, I’ll give you everything except the inner core and gallbladder.”
Those two held the greatest value, true, but the hide and meat carried enough worth to make any hunter swallow hard.
“If you run into the Blood Bear and only you die, that’s one thing. But if the rest of us get caught in the crossfire…”
Wang Se-bang, a hunter with an unusually large nose and ears, faltered mid-sentence. The teacup before him drifted upward, then drifted slowly toward Seo Seok-san.
“A few words and already my throat’s parched.”
The cup remained suspended as a teapot rose into the air beside it, filling the cup with tea.
Seo Seok-san picked up the cup, wet his throat, and turned to Wang Se-bang.
“If you’d rather not, I can find other hunters.”
The five hunters exchanged startled glances before their eyes found one another’s faces.
Anyone who could lift a cup and teapot without touching them wouldn’t perish so easily to a Blood Bear.
Even if that terrible creature did kill him, if the Blood Bear took serious wounds in the fight, it would be the greatest fortune of their lives.
“Fine, let’s go.”
The five hunters, their unspoken understanding complete, became Seo Seok-san’s guides.
Cheon Seok Mountain rose so steeply that its peaks vanished perpetually into mist.
Hunters and herb-gatherers came often enough, but most never ventured beyond the mid-slopes.
Even for the most experienced, Cheon Seok Mountain grew dangerous as one climbed toward the summit.
The seasoned hunters moved with considerable skill, yet from Seo Seok-san’s perspective, their pace was maddeningly slow.
They stopped twice and barely cleared the midpoint. But once they passed Virgin Rock, the hunters’ faces tightened visibly.
“From here, we must be careful. Not just the Blood Bear—all manner of beasts prowl these slopes.”
Indeed, the traces of tigers, leopards, and wolves lingered all around.
“Don’t worry. Move quickly. I’ll protect you from any beast. Just focus on finding the Blood Bear’s trail.”
Even as Seo Seok-san spoke, these were not hunters to place blind faith in a stranger.
They remained cautious, and there was nothing Seo Seok-san could do about it.
He could sense the beasts nearby far better than they could, but finding the Blood Bear’s traces—that was the hunters’ art.
“The Blood Bear is said to live near Cheon Seok Mountain’s summit. Though it roams widely and occasionally appears below the mid-slopes, you usually need to reach near the peak to find it.”
One of the hunters offered this explanation as Seo Seok-san’s frustration mounted.
A roar split the air—deep and bone-shaking.
The hunters went rigid. A tiger’s roar was not a common sound.
Tigers moved quietly except when they fought.
“Sounds like a battle, doesn’t it?”
Tigers had wide territories and sometimes encountered other tigers or beasts, but meeting a creature its equal was rare.
The roar faded as quickly as it had come.
“That’s strange. If it’s fighting anything, the battle shouldn’t end this fast, should it?”
Any beast that provoked a tiger’s roar would be formidable—the fight shouldn’t conclude so suddenly. And if the tiger had lost?
Two words crystallized in their minds: Blood Bear.
“Let’s head toward where the roar came from.”
Wang Se-bang took the lead, the rest following. After moving perhaps two hundred paces through trackless, rough terrain, the hunters began finding signs.
“Is that tiger droppings?”
Fresh and reeking, unmistakably recent. Seo Seok-san pushed his Enhanced Senses to their limit.
He would have wagered half of something unsayable that no tiger lurked within three hundred paces.
But his certainty evaporated the moment they moved fifty paces further.
There was a tiger. It simply wasn’t alive.
‘This doesn’t count. A dead tiger isn’t a tiger.’
As Seo Seok-san made and unmade this private oath, the hunters examined the corpse.
“What is this? Looks like it died in one blow?”
“Yeah. Half its face is gone, but there are no other wounds.”
Only a Blood Bear could kill a tiger like that.
“It can’t be far. Let’s catch it quickly.”
At Seo Seok-san’s words, the hunters gave him a look that asked if he’d lost his mind.
“This is a monster that kills tigers in a single strike. We must be careful. Extremely careful.”
Seo Seok-san chafed at this, but not knowing who they were, he had little choice but to endure it.
The cautious hunters covered only five hundred paces in a double hour.
Before they even found the Blood Bear, Seo Seok-san felt as though he might die of frustration.
“These tracks are fresh—not long old.”
Seo Seok-san raised his Enhanced Senses again, scanning the surroundings. The thick forest, rich with prey, thrummed with the presence and breath of countless beasts.
‘There are some large ones around.’
But he couldn’t tell if the Blood Bear was among them, or which one it was.
“This way.”
The hunters moved toward the summit. Seo Seok-san followed, keeping his Enhanced Senses sharp.
If he sensed something heavier than a tiger, that would be the Blood Bear. And within barely half a double hour, he found it.

***

Following the hunters through winding terrain and over ridge after ridge, Seo Seok-san suddenly caught a sound.
The noise of something striking the earth and pushing through the forest was unmistakably different from anything else.
“Follow me!”
Seo Seok-san called out and hurled himself toward the source of the sound.
“Be careful……!”
The hunters could barely manage even a short warning. They could only mutter after Seo Seok-san, already vanished from sight.
“Is… is he not human?”
Had he failed to notice something in the first place, perhaps. But once Seo Seok-san sensed a presence, he would never lose track of it.
Rushing forward like wind itself, Seo Seok-san discovered beyond the rocks a massive beast tearing into a wild boar.
The bear, clothed in fur as red as its name Blood Bear suggested, towered over twelve feet tall.
Judging by the fact that it had abandoned a tiger it had managed to catch in favor of hunting this boar, the creature certainly had its preferences.
Sensing Seo Seok-san’s approach, the Blood Bear stopped eating and rose to its feet.
A terrible roar split the air.
The beast opened its jaws wide and let out a threatening cry. With nothing to say to a mere animal, Seo Seok-san simply launched his fist.
The Blood Bear took the punch full on the cheek and flew back several lengths before crashing into a massive tree and crumpling to the ground.
It was a blow that could kill even a first-rate master. Yet the Blood Bear rose again. And then it turned and fled, offering its rear. Beasts, after all, always instinctively recognize when they face a stronger opponent.
“Impressive creature.”
Seo Seok-san felt no mercy in sparing it. With a single leap, he closed the distance between himself and the bear, then struck its neck with a hand technique.
With a sickening crack, the Blood Bear went limp. Even a spirit beast could not escape death when its neck was broken.

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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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