Doctor’s Rebirth - Chapter 794

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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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Chapter 794
I began exploring the underground secret warehouse in earnest.
“It’s quite large.”
“Right. Even the Golden Blood Hall would use a space this size as a major supply depot.”
“All these boxes contain opium. And the purity is remarkably high. That means they have the technology and facilities to refine it….”
Where on earth had they managed to bring in something of this scale?
In a world without satellites, helicopters, or drones, it wouldn’t be strange if they’d established a secret poppy farm hidden deep in the mountains somewhere.
But cultivating it and refining it into opium for distribution were entirely different matters.
“Right~ Should we look into it? This is our specialty after all.”
Jin Cheon-hee nodded at Sama Hyeon’s words.
“I’d appreciate that. Even for a family of high officials, bringing something like this without leaving a trace would be nearly impossible.”
No matter how much they wanted to hide it, with this much material, they were bound to leave a trail.
I scratched the back of my head irritably.
“First, I need to find the ledgers for this as well. This is going to get busy. For now… I’ll confiscate all this opium.”
I spoke with a cold expression.
Watching me like that, Sama Hyeon thought to himself.
‘He’s really angry.’
They were a prestigious family with considerable reputation. He understood better than anyone what it meant that they’d personally dealt in opium.
‘He’s angrier than when that quack was going around administering fake preventative injections.’
And the parties involved were far too significant.
* * *
A night when the moon hung high.
Sama Hyeon walked through the darkness.
His clothes were plain martial robes without any distinctive patterns—nothing like his usual attire.
Yet the refined air he naturally exuded came from his distinctive presence.
He withdrew a face-changing mask from his breast and wiped his face once with his sleeve.
Whoosh—
In that single instant, his face transformed.
No one could have noticed the young man’s change.
The young man proceeded directly to the inn.
The server greeted him.
“Welcome! Will you be needing a meal or lodging?”
“Give me a room. One with two windows that have good ventilation.”
The young man’s voice had already transformed into the rough, gravelly voice of a seasoned warrior.
He was the very picture of a wanderer who’d spent twenty years living on sword and rice.
“We have just such a room available!”
The server rubbed his hands together, clearly experienced in dealing with such wanderers.
Following the server up the stairs, a room came into view.
Upon entering, there was already someone waiting inside.
A handsome young man wearing spectacles sat at a table, sipping tea.
His spectacle frames were crafted from gold, lending an air of refinement, yet simultaneously conveying an unmistakable intellectual presence.
Hao Munzhu. Hong Ryu.
“I pay my respects to the Mun-ju.”
Sama Hyeon spoke in that same gravelly voice.
Hong Ryu cast a sidelong glance at Sama Hyeon.
Golden Blood Hall, Hong Lu-gak, Tudo School, Osalji Faction, Gambling Faction.
He was a product of Hong Lu-gak and now commanded all of Hao-mun.
“It has been quite some time, Vice Mun-ju. As expected, your mastery of the Heaven-Shifting Thousand-Faced Art has reached the Tenth Stage. Even accounting for the use of face-changing techniques, only you could transform into a complete ‘other’ in such a manner.”
“You flatter me. Have you not also cultivated such arts, Mun-ju?”
At Sama Hyeon’s words, Hong Ryu smiled and brought a pipe to his lips.
Whoosh—
Smoke billowed thickly throughout the room.
What he inhaled was no common medicinal herb sold in the markets. It was suspected to relate to his martial arts, though none could say for certain.
Such was this place.
Hao-mun.
Unlike the Righteous Faction, they lacked mutual trust, yet between them flowed a viscous bond that outsiders found incomprehensible.
Without such ties, Hao-mun could never have endured through all these long years.
And yet, managing and operating such a chaotic organization remained extraordinarily difficult.
One thing mattered above all: did one possess sufficient strength?
Hong Ryu spoke.
“I wonder. My master did not teach me all of his martial arts before vanishing without a trace. In truth, I myself doubt whether I have properly learned the Heaven-Shifting Thousand-Faced Art. Is that not so, brother?”
Sifu and disciple.
When Sama Hyeon first realized that Hong Ryu had learned the same martial art, suspicion arose before joy.
And that suspicion remained.
Sama Hyeon stood while the Hao Munzhu remained seated.
For a moment, they regarded each other.
Sama Hyeon spoke.
“Seok Nosa did not teach me many things.”
He had imparted only the Heaven-Shifting Thousand-Faced Art to Sama Hyeon before dying, revealing nothing of himself.
“Yet did he not transmit the entirety of the Heaven-Shifting Thousand-Faced Art? To me, he taught only the first half. I can only envy my brother. Someday, you shall inherit all that I possess.”
Thus, through Seok Nosa, the two had become bound by an unintended connection.
“Now then, please be seated.”
“Yes, Mun-ju.”
Sama Hyeon sat across from the Mun-ju.
“Show me your true face.”
“As you command.”
With a soft sound from Sama Hyeon’s face, he wiped it with his sleeve, and immediately his true visage was revealed.
“Hehe. As expected… your master does favor beautiful faces.”
“The Heaven-Shifting Thousand-Faced Art requires the original face to be important—he said this countless times. Since one must constantly change one’s face, one’s true face must be handsome to avoid going mad, he said.”
“Like the supreme techniques of other Heterodox Factions, the Heaven-Shifting Thousand-Faced Art does induce madness when cultivated to profound depths. It seems my master believed that confidence in one’s true face would allow one to maintain one’s center, no matter what form one assumes. Thinking about it now, his words were not without merit.”
Paradoxically, the most crucial aspect of the Thousand Faces Sword Technique was not how swiftly one could change their face.
It was whether one could forget their original face, no matter what they transformed into.
No matter how high a kite soars into the sky, one needs a string to hold it, or it will never return without injury.
The Thousand Faces Sword Technique allowed one to steal not just faces, but voices, movements, and eventually even a warrior’s very consciousness.
Those with weak sense of self would soon be consumed by it, succumbing to madness.
Memories would grow increasingly muddled, and eventually the consciousness of the person one had imitated would bleed into one’s own.
Copying a warrior’s consciousness was an extraordinarily vicious thing.
‘Normally, like other dark arts, the qi pathways would twist and the practitioner would die. But occasionally, genius would suppress that outcome, and only madness would manifest,’ I recalled.
A prodigy so rare that perhaps one appeared in a century.
Even if genius prevented the blood pathways from reversing fatally, I’d heard that one had to abandon being human altogether.
Without protecting oneself, repeating the Thousand Faces Sword Technique would continuously strip away one’s own memories.
Eventually, one would forget who they were, what they did.
Truly, something like a living echo.
What came next? If one descended further into madness?
No one knew.
Even Seok Nosa, and the person who had taught Seok Nosa the Thousand Faces Sword Technique, had never witnessed anyone reach that point in their lifetimes. Even the stage before that was only passed down through oral tradition.
That’s why even Seok Nosa, cautious from the beginning, occasionally experienced fits of madness.
Just as practitioners of other heterodox arts did.
He had lost himself several times, or so I’d heard.
So one must never forget oneself.
Sama Hyeon now had two people who could hold him back.
No matter how beautiful one’s face became, without someone beside you to witness it, you would never return.
Even submerged in dark madness, there was a place where stars shone—that was where he would return to.
Sama-hye.
The character in her name meant a star that sparkles.
Once I found a place to return to, all that remained was to return.
Searching for joyful, happy memories, I retraced my steps without difficulty back to my original form.
Jin Cheon-hee.
Joy was written into my name as well.
No matter how perfectly I imitated an unparalleled master, I would always choose to be myself.
I remembered what was truly precious.
That was also why I experienced less madness compared to my achievements.
Of course, that didn’t mean I was grateful.
If I hadn’t learned the Thousand Faces Sword Technique from the start, I wouldn’t have needed to become entangled with Hao-mun at all.
Under my brother’s guidance, I could have lived as freely as Hye-a, doing as I pleased.
‘If I had known such a technique carried such karmic weight, I might have chosen differently.’
Yet I knew that meeting my brother was an unparalleled stroke of fortune.
A young child needed something to survive alone in Hangzhou.
‘So perhaps I would have died before then if I hadn’t known such a technique.’
For all its complications, the Thousand Faces Sword Technique had been my means of protecting myself in the depths of Hangzhou.
Seok Nosa must have known this, which is why he didn’t mention it when passing down the technique.
“The old man did have such tendencies. But Sifu, why didn’t Master teach you the second half~?”
A bold question that could be seen as provocation. Yet Hong Ryu simply smiled faintly, showing no anger.
“He said I lacked the acting ability for it.”
“Hmm~”
Was that truly the reason? There could be other causes he hadn’t mentioned.
Sama Hyeon didn’t fully trust anyone except Hye-a and his brother.
Yet he rested his chin on his hand, maintaining his usual expression.
He believed half and dismissed the other half.
That was the way of the future Hao Munzhu, Sama Hyeon.
Hong Ryu continued speaking.
“Well, let’s stop with the trivial talk. The reason I came personally is because of the information you requested about ‘opium.'”
“Yes, yes~”
“To cut to the conclusion. Your suspicion was correct.”
He exhaled smoke deeply.
The room filled with the scent of medicinal herbs. Then he continued speaking slowly.
“This massive quantity of opium was brought in through pirates. After the Maritime Faction disappeared, the seas became an uncontrollable region where various pirates now run rampant. Simultaneously, officials who had become corrupted ‘beyond measure’ in various places are significantly increasing their black market dealings with opium and pirates.”
Like a chain reaction, as one link broke, others began to crumble in succession.
“So the game is indeed moving that way~”
“The reason you asked me to focus on investigating the seas. You must have suspected all of this from the beginning, correct?”
“Yes~ There was nowhere else to bring in something like this except the seas~ But if that’s the case, then the strange commission I received might also have ‘such’ reasons mixed in, wouldn’t it~?”
Was it truly sent by the Emperor?
Then why was it this strange ‘commission’ rather than an imperial edict or secret letter?
Even though it was a commission known only to an extremely small number within Hao-mun, the format was quite peculiar.
‘At least I know the motive now. The Emperor is the one who benefits most from this gambling game.’
The Hao Munzhu spoke.
“If we assume it was indeed sent from the imperial palace, then you are the right person for this opium matter. The Osalji Faction and Golden Blood Hall alone wouldn’t be sufficient.”
‘Hmm, the game board is constructed remarkably well~’
Sama Hyeon tapped the table with his fingernail, lost in thought.
The Osalji Faction. And the Golden Blood Hall.
These two were actually the strongest military organizations within Hao-mun. Even so, they fell short compared to the military forces of other major sects.
With such a massive amount of opium discovered, those involved would move to survive.
I couldn’t even imagine how high-ranking the individuals connected to the Gaju of the monster family that was captured this time might be.
And naturally, those high-ranking individuals’ target would be Prefect Jin Cheon-hee.
Even the Emperor himself could be assassinated in the Hwa Empire.
Wasn’t it common for a well-living prefect to drown in water one day, choke on rice cake and die, or get stabbed by a wild boar while hunting?
Even with protective barriers of benevolence, they still managed to die when their time came.
Therefore, Sama Hyeon made calculations.
Unlike Jin Cheon-hee, who laid out positions like playing Go, reading the opponent’s intentions while placing his moves one by one to find the truth—
Rather, Sama Hyeon’s deduction was like weaving fabric.
I read the pattern that emerges as the warp and weft threads cross and interweave.
Within it flows a touch of evidence, a spark of inspiration, and a measure of experience.
When faced with a choice between two paths, I imagine the more entertaining one.
I imagine, and imagine again.
That is the way of Hao Munzhu’s successor, Sama Hyeon Gwang Myeon-hori.
In the depths of Hangzhou, as a child without the means to afford scripts or sheet music from other operas, I had to deduce entire stories on my own.
It didn’t matter if I was wrong. As long as it was entertaining.
The completed stories often resembled the original operas, and sometimes they were even more entertaining than the originals.
Is the conclusion I’ve reached at the end of this imagination truly entertaining?
That childhood habit remains with me even now.
‘If the Emperor’s design is correct, then the design itself is plausible. The fact that work fell to Hao-mun, a Heterodox Faction, makes sense too. Jin Cheon-hee, Sama Hyeon, Hao-mun and the Five Wheel Society… and Baekrin Uiseon on top of that.’
Using my brother, it’s an excellent opportunity to completely eradicate the opium that has seeped deep into the Empire.
If the Imperial Eight Families are involved, this is the perfect chance to achieve something without lifting a finger.
But catching a fish on a hook is a different matter from keeping the bait intact, isn’t it?
If the Emperor plans to use my brother again, it makes sense to assign me as his guard.
‘It’s a beautiful picture. Efficient too. The way it excludes human emotion—bloodless and tearless, befitting an Emperor.’
And one more thing.
‘Since I’m caught in the middle, it’s a perfect setup for me to die protecting my brother.’
Sama Hyeon laughed with a bitter edge.

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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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