I Shouldn't Have Joined the Martial Arts Alliance - Chapter 34

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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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Joining the Murim Alliance for no good reason — Episode 34
‘……What the hell is this guy?’
‘……Is he serious?’
‘……No way, right?’
‘Come on, surely…….’
‘If he were human…….’
‘But he’s not human…….’
‘Ah…….’
He’d always known Saurin had strange quirks, but not to this degree.
So Jang Hyein asked.
“……You’re joking, right?”
He wanted to believe it was.
“Was what the team leader just said a joke?”
“……No.”
How could it be?
He’d announced it with such ceremony.
Boosting the morale of his teammates in the process.
“So there you have it.”
Saurin wasn’t joking either.
“The team leader said it, so that’s why I’m asking.”
His teammates desperately wanted someone to survive, and even someone as coldhearted as Saurin should grant them this much.
“Ah…….”
He couldn’t organize his thoughts on how to interpret this, how to respond.
He’d never imagined in his wildest dreams that he’d face such an absurd situation staring death in the face…….
Not just Jang Hyein, but all his teammates had lost their senses and weren’t thinking about pulling him back.
“What should we do?”
“……Well……, that is……, I mean…….”
Hyung Jun cut in and spoke to Saurin.
“If you stay here, can any of us survive alongside you?”
“No, sir. Then I wouldn’t survive either.”
“As I thought……. Then leave now.”
“……Really?”
Jang Hyein nodded vigorously and chimed in as well.
“That’s right. Go now, like he said.”
The other team members spoke one by one, their eyes glistening with tears.
“Get out of here, kid!”
“You’re still too young anyway. So hurry and go!”
“You have to survive! Don’t forget about us.”
“That’s right! Survive and tell them how we died! Understand?!”
“Yes! Then our deaths won’t be meaningless. Now go!”
“Go, hurry!”
He might have wanted to grab hold of them.
They were all sincere. It looked that way to Saurin too.
He felt something stir in his chest.
‘It was the same back then…….’
Even though it could have been a place to die, the older brothers and ajusshi from the gambling den hadn’t left him behind, had they?
“Then…….”
But then something suspicious caught in Saurin’s perception.
“Wait a moment.”
“Yeah, you need time to think…….”
“No, sir. That’s not it. The number of people has increased.”
“Increased? What do you mean, increased? Don’t tell me……. ……How many?”
“……About twenty……, I think.”
“Then go. Before it gets any later.”
“It’s too late. Or rather……, it’s impossible.”
“What do you mean?”
At first, he thought maybe Dang Won Hu, the head of the Sacheon Tang Family, had arrived. He’d assumed the man had come to rescue the Sunyeong County branch, drawn by the scent of blood from his own method.
But it wasn’t.
Hadn’t he felt the aura of the Sacheon Tang Family head right beside him? That’s how he could tell.
It wasn’t Dang Won Hu, the head of the Sacheon Tang Family.
“There’s one supreme master.”
One comparable even to the Sacheon Tang Family patriarch.
Jang Hyein’s eyes widened like saucers. The other team members felt the same shock wash over them.
“……Really?”
No, he’d wanted to say something else. It seemed unnecessary to send someone so formidable just to kill them—there were simpler ways to do that.
Sure, he understood the desire to finish things cleanly, but no matter how he thought about it, wasn’t this overkill?
“Could it be the Baek Ri Family patriarch himself?”
The Sal Wang wouldn’t have anyone of that caliber.
Unless the Heuk Wol Mun master—the one called Sal Wang in the current Kangho—had come himself.
So it definitely wasn’t the Sal Wang.
Moving the Sal Wang required an astronomical sum of money. No fool would spend that kind of fortune just to kill a few Murim Alliance warriors.
Moreover, the qi he felt carried none of the Sal Wang’s signature presence.
“I can’t say for certain.”
He’d never felt the Baek Ri Family patriarch’s aura up close, nor seen him from a distance, so there was no way to know.
“And all twenty of them are masters.”
“……All twenty?”
All twenty were masters on par with Jang Hyein. There might be slight variations among them, but that was the gist of it.
Saurin simply nodded without speaking. He couldn’t make sense of it either.
He was only now grasping how terrifying the Kangho truly was. Though it was already too late.
The team members’ shoulders sagged under the weight of what they’d just heard.
“Christ.”
“So what are they expecting us to do?”
“Sounds like they’re just telling us to drop dead.”
“Hell, what a letdown.”
Even that sliver of hope—that they might survive—had been crushed.
Hyung Jun asked Saurin to confirm once more, as if he couldn’t believe it.
“Youngest. Double-check for us.”
“I’ve already checked twice.”
“……Damn it all.”
A sigh escaped from every throat.
“Ugh.”
“Hah.”
Then they tilted their heads back toward the sky, where stars and moon gleamed.
“Yeah, we’re going. Going soon, all right?”
“Don’t shine so bright—we’ll be there soon enough.”
“It’ll just make us sadder if you glitter like that.”
“Seriously, damn it.”
Yet even in this moment, Jang Hyein hadn’t lost his smile.
“So you’re giving up? You’re not. Let’s fight to the end. Yeah? Let’s do what we can. Everything we’re capable of. There was a time when we all dreamed of dying beautifully in battle, wasn’t there? Wasn’t there?”
There was.
Though they’d since become stained by the Kangho, their eyes clouded by power and ambition, losing sight of what they’d once dreamed of—but what was stopping them from remembering it now?
And so, light began to kindle again in the team members’ eyes.
“You’re right. Like the captain says, we…….”
Saurin cut the sentence short again.
“Wait.”
“……Why again?”
Even if more came, he felt no fear anymore.
“……Something feels…….”
“Something feels what? Spit it out.”
“Off.”
“What do you mean?”
He couldn’t make sense of it at all.
Then it happened.
From beyond the walls of the Sunyeong County branch, sounds full of confusion began to drift in.
Familiar groans and screams.
Red blood and death painting themselves unbidden across the mind’s eye.
Coming from everywhere at once.
“……What……what is this……?”
“……What’s happening……?”
“……What is this? It’s… creepy……?”
That was the case.
They had been prepared to accept their deaths, but hearing the sounds of death announced from a completely unexpected quarter felt as though they’d been possessed by a ghost.
Those groans and screams should have been theirs—Team Eleven’s own.
The moans and shrieks grew louder, echoing across the entire Sunyeong County branch as if enveloping it whole.
Cold sweat poured down without reason.
As though they’d lost control of their own bodies.
For about half an incense stick’s time—seven or eight minutes—the groans and screams that made Team Eleven’s skin crawl continued, then suddenly ceased altogether.
Saurin, Jang Hyein, and the team members all held their breath, drawing their perception to its absolute limit.
“……Is it over?”
“……It seems like it?”
“Or is it not?”
“Is it our turn next?”
“Youngest, what do you think?”
“They’re gone.”
“……Gone? What do you mean by that?”
“One Supreme Expert and twenty Masters with fifty Sal Wang—they’ve dealt with all of them and withdrawn.”
The team members’ eyes widened.
“Really?”
“Seriously?”
“Then we… we survived?”
“It seems that way.”
“Whoa!”
Thud.
Seo Woo Chan suddenly collapsed where he stood as the tension drained from his legs.
Thud.
It wasn’t just Seo Woo Chan.
Thud, thud.
One by one, all the team members sank to the ground.
“We lived.”
“We’re alive.”
“Damn. Feels like I just visited the underworld.”
“Tell me about it.”
“God. I just aged ten years.”
Aged ten years? Hardly.
It was as if they’d given up every remaining day of Team Eleven’s lives.
It was a moment beyond belief. They had truly thought death was upon them.
There were no words to express the joy. And yet they couldn’t express it.
What flowed from the team members was nothing but relief.
“I’ll just step outside for a moment and check on things, then come back.”
One of the sprawled team members spoke with weary eyes.
“Just wait a bit. What’s the rush?”
“Yeah. Let your mind settle first.”
“What’s the hurry? Let’s just live a little longer, yeah?”
With the relief of having survived, there was no strength left in their bodies.
“It’s fine. I’ll just go alone and come back.”
Jang Hyein backed Saurin up.
“I’ll come with you. The rest of you just stay and rest.”
And so Jang Hyein followed in Saurin’s wake.
A grin split his face so wide it seemed it might tear at the edges as he watched Saurin’s retreating back.
‘This one’s the real deal, I’m telling you!’
Yet Saurin hadn’t actually done anything.
Or rather, Jang Hyein didn’t know what it was, but he had a strong instinct that this entire situation was because of the youngest, Saurin.
* * *
Baek Ri Family head Baek Ri Hyeon had issued orders to eliminate Baek Ri Hyeon, his sister Baek Ri Hyang, and his cousin Baek Ri Ga Jin, then immediately set out for the Baek Ri Manor.
There was no need to wait for news of their elimination at the inner residence. Besides, it was wise to maintain distance when the Murim Alliance branch disappeared.
Absent any unexpected variables, the work would be handled cleanly.
If forced to name one particular variable, it was the sudden appearance of the Demonic Sect’s Supreme Expert Jang Ryeo in Sungdo, but since the witch Jang Ryeo was someone completely unrelated to them, he paid her no mind.
And so Baek Ri Hyeon, Baek Ri Hyang, and Baek Ri Ga Jin settled into a carriage with at ease, heading toward the Baek Ri Manor with the assurance that matters had concluded well.
But then the carriage, which had been traveling at an easy pace, suddenly came to a halt. So Baek Ri Hyeon asked the escort knight who was riding alongside the carriage.
“What is it?”
“My apologies. There is a woman blocking the road ahead, so I had to stop for a moment. Please wait just a little longer. I will clear the way and return shortly.”
“Then do so.”
The escort led the horse forward slowly. As they drew nearer to the woman, her face became progressively clearer.
‘……Surely not…….’
And as they drew closer still, certainty crystallized.
‘……No……’
The escort had heard the rumors—that the Demonic Sect’s Supreme Expert, the Witch, had appeared in Sungdo.
‘But……why here……?’
He had no way of knowing why she was standing in the middle of the road, but a headache seemed imminent.
The Witch was nothing but a madwoman who did whatever pleased her.
The escort tried to dismount with utmost courtesy.
That was when—
“No, don’t get down. Just turn around and tell your master to come here. Those three fools.”
So the escort remained on his horse.
“Forgive me, but what matter calls for us……?”
“Would you prefer to die? Is that what you’d like?”
He had heard rumors aplenty about the Witch, and she matched them exactly.
“……Ah, no. I will convey the message.”
The escort spun his horse around and galloped back to the carriage. Upon arriving at the front of it, he dismounted quickly and knocked on the carriage door.
His four colleagues, who had been moving in formation, looked at their comrade with bewildered eyes.
“Have you cleared the way?”
“My apologies, but you must come out and see for yourselves.”
“……What?”
“The woman standing in front of the carriage is Jang Ryeo of the Jang Family.”
Crack!
The carriage door flew open.
“Are you certain of what you just said?”
“I am. And she has summoned all three of you directly—the family head, the young master, and the young lady.”
Baek Ri Hyeon, Baek Ri Hyang, and Baek Ri Ga Jin all furrowed their brows.
“For what reason?”
“I was not informed.”
Baek Ri Hyang, who stood nearby, spoke up.
“Brother, I think it would be best if we go at once.”
“That is true, elder brother. She is the Witch, after all. And surely she would not dare lay a hand on the Baek Ri Family alone. No matter how mad she is.”
“Mad enough to be capable of anything—that is the problem.”
“Brother, still, I do not think we have a choice right now. If we keep her waiting much longer, there is no telling what trouble she might cause.”
“……Very well.”
And so Baek Ri Hyeon, Baek Ri Hyang, and Baek Ri Ga Jin began to approach the Witch.
Utterly unaware of the reason why.

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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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