Acquiring the Murim with Money - Chapter 29

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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 29. Unhand Him

Before opening the door, Baek Unhuii paused.
His ribs throbbed dully. A handful of crumpled coins still lay clenched in his palm, worn thin from gripping.
He stared down at them, seized by an odd thought.
‘What expression would Kang Tae-seok wear right now?’
It was a strange question—the kind he’d never ask himself.
The memory of Kang Tae-seok remained sharp. The cold floor of the Underground Parking Garage. The sensation of hot blood seeping between his fingers. The hollow sense that despite a lifetime chasing money, not a single coin had mattered when death came.
Yet something felt off.
The memory was vivid, but separate from that vividness, it was fading away—growing distant with each passing day.
Like a dream from childhood that had felt so real and so intense at the time—the details still recalled, yet the sensation stripped away as years went by.
Baek Unhuii couldn’t pinpoint exactly when the life he’d lived as Kang Tae-seok had begun to feel like a previous existence.
The tightening in his chest when Baek Yeonhwa drew her sword and stepped in front of him. The way his legs nearly buckled when his father’s eyes opened. And now, in this moment—his hands trembling even as he knew who waited beyond the door.
As Kang Tae-seok, he’d sprinted toward one goal: success. He’d forgotten emotion, or rather—had never forgotten it so much as worn a mask, holding it down ruthlessly. To avoid being hurt. To avoid losing.
But living as Baek Unhuii, those emotions he’d thought buried were surfacing relentlessly.
He found himself unmoored in moments where genuine feeling poured out like this.
No.
‘Who am I right now? If I’m living in Baek Unhuii’s body, with Baek Unhuii’s memories, and feeling his emotions as my own—can I really say I’m not Baek Unhuii?’
Baek Unhuii.
The name felt natural now—so natural that he couldn’t quite remember when he’d begun thinking of himself by it without the slightest dissonance.
‘I don’t know. But.’
Baek Unhuii opened his hand. The crumpled coins lay exposed on his palm.
‘One thing’s clear—I’m angry right now.’
As Kang Tae-seok, he would never have let emotion take the lead. He would have calculated coldly, scrubbed away all feeling, selected the strongest cards, and sat down at the negotiating table with perfect composure.
So why was his head pounding white-hot with nothing but useless, spiraling emotion?
Four years since his father collapsed and his brother vanished. The thoughtless youngest son had let despair and impotence swallow him whole—and in those four years, Baek Yeonhwa had struggled alone, pushing herself to the breaking point. The merchant guild, already listing, had crumbled in an instant.
Baek Unhuii tucked the crumpled coins into his robe.
Then, with a scowl carved into his face, he opened the door.
“It’s been a while, isn’t it?”
A low, cold voice echoed through the room.

Baek Unhuii pulled the chair across from him and sat.
Silence stretched between them.
Baek Unhuii studied his brother and chose his words carefully—not waiting for Baek Unjyeol to speak first, but deciding what needed to be said from the depths of his own heart.
As Kang Tae-seok, he would have wielded this silence strategically. Made the other man speak first. Gathered intelligence. Calculated his position. Only then opened his mouth.
But Baek Unhuii spoke first.
“I thought you were dead. Four years.”
He’d meant to keep his voice steady, but emotion bled through despite himself.
“You led the merchant guild away from us—you and everyone with you disappeared. And every single day after that, she stood at the guild gates with a sword. When we ran out of money for Father’s medicine and had to sell the rice from storage. When the Black Poison Guild thugs came trampling through the yard. She was alone.”
Baek Unjyeol said nothing.
“Where were you all those four years?”
It was a short question, but it held years of suppressed emotion.
Baek Unjyeol slowly withdrew his hand from the table, his expression unmoved, and spoke.
“I was occupied.”
“Occupied?”
Baek Unhuii echoed the words back.
“Was sending a single message so difficult? A word that you were alive?”
“The circumstances didn’t allow for it, and there was no need. And you—what were you doing while she struggled alone like that?”
“I… I was—”
Before Baek Unhuii could mount a defense, a cold gaze and words shot across the table like arrows.
“Yeonhwa’s skill is more than enough to handle third-rate street thugs. But I’ve been watching the guild’s situation carefully. I know how pathetically you fell apart like a man who’d given up on life. And I hear that recently you’ve changed somehow—running around stirring up trouble—but you’re still a child.”
Baek Unhuii bit his lip hard and glared, finding no words to throw back.
Baek Unjyeol’s eyes bored into his. “Baek Unhuii. Get yourself together. You didn’t come here to air grievances against me, did you? I’m standing here now as Guild Master of the Cheonma Merchant Guild. Make it clear. Are you here as the Acting Head of the Baek Woon Merchant Guild, or are you just a foolish younger brother playing at being Baek Unhuii?”
Faced with Baek Unjyeol’s image as the Cheonma Merchant Guild’s Guild Master—measured, sharp, flawless—Baek Unhuii began to collect himself.
“Of course I came here as the Guild Master of the Baek Woon Merchant Guild. As Acting Head of the household. You’re right. So why did you want to see me so suddenly?”
Baek Unjyeol hesitated for a moment, then returned to his original sharp, measured tone.
“If you hadn’t stirred up trouble, I wouldn’t have needed to see you this urgently. First—you should have enough sense for this, but be careful not to reveal anything about my identity.”
Baek Unjyeol exhaled so shallowly that only someone listening carefully would notice, then continued.
“You suddenly began expanding the guild aggressively, and it complicated things. I’ll explain simply, so listen carefully. That day four years ago you’ve been curious about. After Father collapsed, I stepped forward as Acting Head of Household and led our first major trade expedition. Everyone who departed with me on that journey died.”
The room fell silent.
“My subordinates who trusted and followed me. My colleagues with whom I pioneered trade routes and endured hardship together. And.”
Baek Unjyeol paused.
“Yeo Suryeon.”
That single name settled heavily in the air.
Baek Unhuii fell quiet. He remembered now, clearly.
Baek Unjyeol, who had always been overwhelmingly superior in every way since childhood but lacked a certain warmth—that same man had met Yeo Suryeon, a woman with a smile as gentle as a spring day, and afterward became someone entirely different.
“By some miracle, only I survived. I was fortunate. I barely crawled back from death, and it felt like a dream. So many people were lost, yet not a trace remained. As I tracked down those behind it, I finally learned—though it took every ounce of effort—just how formidable the force I would have to face truly was.”
Baek Unjyeol placed his hand back on the table as he spoke.
“Revenge consumed my every thought, but I had no means to pursue it. To my knowledge, there was only one place in this world capable of standing against such a hidden and powerful force.”
“But still—no matter what—we haven’t even learned who did this to us, whether you’re really alive, and yet…”
“What if you did?”
Baek Unjyeol fixed Baek Unhuii with a cold stare.
Now that Baek Unhuii understood the circumstances of four years ago with clarity, he could say nothing more.
With the household head incapacitated and key members of the Baek Woon Merchant Guild, beginning with Baek Unjyeol, vanished, the guild was already crumbling rapidly. If word never reached those who operated so covertly that Baek Unjyeol lived—if his existence remained hidden—the probability of them attacking the Baek Woon Merchant Guild further was slim.
The two brothers sat in silence for a moment.
“…The Cheonma Merchant Guild’s intelligence network was already operating in Nakyang. And about four months ago, strange movements suddenly began appearing in the Nakyang merchant circles.”
He let out a short laugh.
It was the first time he had laughed like this. But it was a laugh of exasperation, of absurdity.
“The Guild Master of the Baek Woon Merchant Guild was right in the center of it.”
“That was the problem, then.”
“Right. Do you know what you’ve been touching?”
“The Blood Cult.”
Baek Unjyeol’s eyes narrowed.
“Where did you hear that?”
“Well. I nearly died from their bomb attack this time.”
The room fell silent again.
Baek Unjyeol tapped a finger on the table once, then spoke.
“Yes. It seems the Blood Cult moved directly this time. Which means you’ve become enough of a thorn in their side. That’s partly why I met with you so urgently. You’ve likely already guessed it, but the Pungcheon Merchant Guild is a subordinate force of the Blood Cult. More precisely, rather than the entire guild itself being a Blood Cult organization, it’s probably that the guild leader or one or two key figures above are quietly bound to the Blood Cult. Most operate this way—that’s why they remain so hidden.”
Baek Unjyeol rose from his seat and approached the window.
By now, darkness had fallen outside, and a single shaft of moonlight illuminated his face.
“Baek Unhuii.”
“….”
“This is where it ends. You’re not ready yet.”
His voice, oddly, was not entirely cold.
“I’ll be honest—I’m surprised. I always thought of you as a thoughtless youngest brother, but this has been hard to believe. You’ve revived the guild, struck at the Blood Cult’s funding channels, even absorbed the Outcasts. And yet….”
“And yet?”
“Those people cannot be defeated that way. No matter how carefully you nurture people and pay fair prices while maintaining the Merchant’s Way—a sandcastle, no matter how painstakingly built, crumbles in an instant. They don’t choose their means or methods. Neither do I. Evil can only be met with greater evil. You must withdraw now.”
“What I’m building isn’t merely a sandcastle.”
“The Blood Cult doesn’t end here. Nakyang is only one of countless strongholds. No matter how you flourish here, you can’t strike a blow against their core. And because you suddenly expanded the scope recklessly, you’ve introduced unexpected variables into my own plans as well.”
“So what you’re saying is, I should abandon everything my guild family has achieved through blood and sweat, and run?”
“Yes. Immediately.”
Baek Unjyeol withdrew his gaze from the window and turned around.
“Surrender your interests in the Nakyang merchant circles. Soon the Cheonma Merchant Guild will enter fully and clash with Pungcheon. Hand over Baek Woon’s interests to the Cheonma. In exchange.”
He placed a seal on the table.
It was a Guarantee Seal stamped with the Cheonma Merchant Guild’s insignia.
“If you stop here, I guarantee the safety of everyone in the Baek Woon Merchant Guild. Father in his declining years will be safe. Yeonhwa will be safe. Don’t commit the folly of endangering your own people because of youthful stubbornness.”
After staring at the seal in silence for some time, Baek Unhuii finally spoke.
“You really are something, brother. From childhood, once you decided on a result you wanted, you seized it by any means necessary. You never looked back in the process. I was compared to you, treated as a failure, and I resented you, even envied you. Yet at the same time, I trusted that you could handle anything, so I lived without bearing real responsibility.”
Baek Unhuii continued, his expression now calm, as if his thoughts had crystallized.
“The safety of my family, our guild’s hard-earned accomplishments being taken by your Cheonma Merchant Guild with a few words, bearing everything alone and facing that enormous enemy in revenge—these are all your thoughts, your desired outcomes. But I’m no longer the thoughtless youngest brother standing in your shadow, looking only at you. I’ll build our family’s safety, grow our guild, and strike back at the Blood Cult—all in my own way, with my own people.”
A subtle hint of a smile appeared at the corners of Baek Unjyeol’s lips.
“Interesting. Your words sound convincing, but so you’re just going to push all of them into danger?”
“No. As a merchant, avoiding losses is the right choice. I won’t clash directly with the Blood Cult right away, as you’ve suggested. I’ll hand over the interests if I can. But I can’t give them away for nothing. You need this trade for your own reasons, don’t you? Of course I should receive fair compensation.”
Baek Unjyeol raised an eyebrow slightly.
“And the core operations that form the backbone of our guild—the things only we can do—I’ll keep those. You’ve guaranteed the safety of our people, and if I hand over interests in a way that makes our guild appear non-threatening, that should work fine, shouldn’t it?”
“You’ve added quite a few conditions.”
“They’re legitimate demands as Guild Master of the Baek Woon Merchant Guild.”
A brief silence fell.
Baek Unjyeol let out a quiet laugh.
“Right. I’ll send someone tomorrow to handle the detailed arrangements.”
Baek Unhuii rose from his seat as he spoke.
“I’m truly sorry about what happened four years ago. …You won’t see the family?”
“Not yet. And you—forget that you saw me today.”
“……Don’t try to carry it all alone. We’re family.”
Baek Unjyeol did not answer.

Buying Out the Martial World — Chapter 29

Author
Song Jjyeonbol
Publisher
Daon Creative
Planning / Editing / Production
Yun Tae-ri
Cover Design
Shik

UCI
G720:N+A036-20260907057.0029

ⓒ2026, Song Jjyeonbol

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Without the permission of the author and publisher, no part or all of this work may be reproduced or processed in any form.

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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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