I Shouldn't Have Joined the Martial Arts Alliance - Chapter 37

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

Why I ever joined the Murim Alliance — Chapter 37
I never would have imagined it.
I didn’t even know a mother existed, and that she was the supreme leader of the Evil Sect — that was beyond anything I could have conceived.
This is a story that wouldn’t appear even in dreams or novels.
A mother who hadn’t existed for eighteen years suddenly appears, and she’s the supreme leader commanding the Evil Sect?
Who in their right mind would speak such madness?
Sa Urin’s mind went blank.
“Sudden, isn’t it?”
“…Yes, somewhat.”
“Are you confused because your mother is part of the Evil Sect? If that’s the case….”
Since Sa Chol-gang and she had spent more than two years together, it was reasonable to expect that his views on the Evil Sect and the Demon Sect would match hers.
“No, it’s not that.”
“Then I’m relieved. But since you say it isn’t, now I’m curious. What does my son think of the Evil Sect?”
“Honestly, I’m not sure. I’ve never seriously thought about the Righteous Sect or the Evil Sect.”
“Then why did you join the Murim Alliance?”
He wouldn’t have entered without reason.
“Father had a lifelong wish.”
“A lifelong wish of Sa Chol-gang’s? Did he have one?”
“There was something he always said when he drank.”
“I met you and had you — I thought my wish was already fulfilled. Wasn’t it?”
Apparently it wasn’t.
“Father’s lifelong wish was to become the leader of the Murim Alliance and build a Murim Alliance that was truly worthy of the name.”
In that moment, Jang Ryeo doubted her own ears.
“…What? A Murim Alliance worthy of the name?”
“Yes.”
“Sa Chol-gang said that? Your father told you something like that?”
“…Yes.”
The witch Jang Ryeo’s mouth fell open.
Wasn’t this absolutely absurd?
A Murim Alliance worthy of the name?
What in the world was a Murim Alliance worthy of the name supposed to be?
Complete nonsense — grasping at clouds.
In short, it was pure drivel.
Jang Ryeo was all the more astonished because, despite spending more than two years with Sa Chol-gang, she had never heard such talk from him.
“Sa Chol-gang isn’t stupid enough for that….”
Though he had a rigid, stiff side to him, she’d thought his mind was reasonably sharp….
“Is that really such a strange thing to say?”
“Strange indeed. Ask these people here. See how nonsensical it sounds.”
Sa Urin turned his head to look at Jang Hye-in. The witch Jang Ryeo gestured for him to speak freely.
“…Honestly, I… don’t even know what ‘worthy of the name’ means. I’ve never heard such a phrase before.”
When Jang Hye-in finished speaking, O Hyeong-jun beside him continued.
“…Isn’t that something that would only appear in dreams? Of course, before that, as the squad leader said, we’d first need to define what ‘worthy of the name’ even means.”
The conversation continued on to the next person.
“Hmm…I think the Murim Alliance is already worthy of the name right now? There’s nothing special about it, is there? The Murim Alliance is the Murim Alliance, what else would it be?”
“Sorry. Thinking about things like that gives me a headache….”
“…Me too. Rather than think about such things, I’d rather practice more.”
They were all saying similar things.
“You heard them, son?”
Sa Urin’s expression grew deeply troubled.
“But why did Father have such a dream?”
“How would I know? But did you have any thoughts on it?”
“I did. Justice, chivalry, order in the Murim, peace — things like that. Helping the weak, killing the wicked, that sort of thing.”
Jang Ryeo heaved such a weary sigh at her son’s words that the earth itself seemed to cave in, and the squad members drank deeply from their cups in frustration.
“Sigh… My son.”
“Is it that strange?”
“Son. Those things flow from novels or from people’s mouths, but they’re impossible in reality. Think carefully. For a martial artist, martial art is power. They use that power to eat and live in Gangho. When that power grows stronger, it becomes authority. And using the authority they’ve gained, they pursue what they wish to accomplish. In other words, martial artists are those who crush others with power and authority, or kill them to profit. Of course, just as you say, occasionally — very occasionally — they do end up saving the weak or those they love. But that’s only a side effect that arises in the process of gaining profit. Do you understand now?”
Sa Urin nodded as if he understood.
“I do.”
“Then has your thinking changed now?”
“Why?”
“……Why? Why are you like this, my son? Are you trying to frighten me?”
The Squad members’ faces were equally bewildered.
“As Mother says, I suppose I should use strength and power to achieve what I’ve been dreaming of. Isn’t that right? Using strength and power to accomplish my goals.”
A sigh rose unbidden from deep within his chest.
“Ha. Like father, like son — there’s no mistaking it.”
Utterly thick-headed, the both of them.
“I think I take after Mother more, actually?”
From every angle, he was her spitting image.
“……This won’t do. I need to take back what I said about going with your mother.”
“Why?”
“Were you even planning to go? You never had any intention of it.”
“Still, once a promise leaves your lips, it feels cruel to take it back.”
His mother Jang Ryeo had seemed to care for him, and it felt good. Like he was being loved.
Jang Ryeo tilted her head from side to side, puzzled.
“……Something strange just tumbled out of my belly.”
He resembled Sa Chol-gang, yet also seemed to take after Jang Ryeo herself — but there was something different about him.
More than just strange; it was almost bizarre.
Then she turned her gaze toward the 11th Squad members.
“You lot are going to have your hands full.”
They already had plenty to deal with, so this was hardly surprising news.
“What’s with that look in your eyes? Have you all given up already?”
Jang Hye-in answered.
“Not so much given up as……resigned ourselves to it.”
“……True enough. That’s easier on the conscience, isn’t it? Our son seems to have found good companions. You’re all cut from the same cloth, by the look of it.”
“……I’m sorry? What do you mean by that……?”
Was it an insult or a compliment? Impossible to say.
Jang Ryeo emptied her cup again.
“That’s enough. I should be going.”
“Already?”
Sa Urin felt a pang of disappointment. She was his mother, after all — he’d only just met her.
“Why? Will you stay a little longer?”
“Yes.”
A smile bloomed across Jang Ryeo’s face.
Even if it were false, it was still a lovely thing to hear.
“Your mother wants to as well, but if I stay much longer, I’m afraid I won’t be able to tear myself away.”
Witch though she might be, she was still a person — and a mother to one son.
“Son. If ever you grow disillusioned with the Murim Alliance, or find you no longer wish to be part of it, come to your mother anytime. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
Simple and direct — the way he preferred it.
Whether she truly meant it or would never allow such a thing remained utterly inscrutable.
Yet his lips curved upward of their own accord.
If even the Supreme Leader of the Evil Sect herself couldn’t fathom what her son was thinking, then surely no one else could either.
Which meant his odds of surviving and growing stronger were all the higher for it.
“Then, I’m off.”
And so the Supreme Leader of the Evil Sect, the witch Jang Ryeo, gracefully deployed the Void Walking and vanished with elegant ease.
“……Wow!”
“That’s……!”
“……Incredible!”
“Never seen anything like it……!”
Sa Urin felt pride in his mother’s display. And yet there was a twinge of regret as well.
He’d wanted to spar with her.
That was why he’d hoped she would stay longer.
Meanwhile.
While the Squad members’ eyes were drawn to Jang Ryeo’s Void Walking, their Squad Leader Jang Hye-in was absorbed in thoughts of an entirely different nature.
‘Damn……’
What would happen now?
The youngest’s mother was the Supreme Leader of the Evil Sect. If the Murim Alliance ever discovered this fact, what would become of them?
Surely the witch herself was aware of this complication — so why hadn’t she mentioned it, and simply left?
And didn’t Dok Wang already know of it?
Jang Hye-in had grasped a golden lifeline in the form of the Sacheon Dang Family — thanks, of course, to the youngest. But regardless, Jang Hye-in too was now holding onto that golden lifeline…….
A sigh.
It makes him wonder whether the Sacheon Dang Family would push the youngest even if they knew this fact.
If it became known that Jang Ryeo, the supreme leader of the Evil Sect, was the youngest’s mother, then the Sacheon Dang Family backing him would gain nothing but trouble.
And so beneath Jang Hye-in’s long sigh, the moon set and the sun rose. Time moved forward, and years passed.
After that, the 11th Squad devoted themselves to training without major incident.
All members of the 11th Squad grew stronger.
Sa Urin, needless to say.
His Hun-won Gong and the divine technique Seom-cheon Roe-bo had reached the fifth tier. Dark Shadow Divine Technique and Heavenly Thunder Divine Technique had reached the fourth.
And along with it, the youngest Sa Urin’s willful nature also grew—no, intensified.
The squad members came to understand.
That the words pouring from Sa Urin’s mouth about helping the weak and implementing justice were all utter nonsense.
That the youngest was no different from those dime-a-dozen men in the Murim Alliance.
Wasn’t it so?
Truly, if the youngest really wanted to build a proper Murim Alliance as he claimed, he wouldn’t act so arbitrarily toward his seniors.
And so a year passed, and finally the time came for the 11th Squad to leave Sichuan Province and return to the Murim Alliance.
* * *
The Jang Clan of Guizhou Province had established themselves as the Jang Merchant Company in Chengdu three hundred years ago, and had earned renown as one of the ten greatest merchant houses of the Central Plains for a hundred years after that.
But the Jang Merchant Company had grown sick of handing over the wealth they’d built through blood and sweat to martial artists so meaninglessly, and two hundred years ago declared their transformation into a martial sect.
For a merchant company to transform into a martial sect was not so extraordinary. Everyone started that way. Better to become martial artists themselves than to toil only to hand over their earnings to warriors, they’d reasoned.
But they all failed.
Yet the Jang Clan undertook the challenge anyway. And lo, they succeeded brilliantly.
And that was not all.
Fifty years ago, they boldly claimed a place among the seven major Evil Sects. And now, the supreme leader of the Evil Sect, Jang Ryeo, is one of their own.
Late into the night, Jang Yu-un, the family head of the Jang Clan, was engaged in a grueling battle with stacks of documents piled high before him.
Then, without his permission, the office door swung open. So Jang Yu-un, family head of the Jang Clan, furrowed his brow and lifted his eyes toward the open doorway.
His eyes went wide as lanterns in an instant.
“……Is that……you? What brings you here?”
His younger sister, Jang Ryeo, the supreme leader of the Evil Sect, had appeared for the first time in five years.
He hoped desperately it was a dream, but that was utterly impossible.
“What? I’m coming to my own home. Something wrong with that?”
“……No, it’s just—you haven’t shown your face in five years, and then you suddenly appear.”
“Has it really been that long?”
Jang Yu-un was suddenly overwhelmed by exhaustion and grabbed the back of his neck.
“Yes. But tell me—why?”
Truly, he couldn’t understand it, couldn’t fathom the reason. If she were simply mad, if her mind had truly come loose, he could at least accept it. But this? He wanted nothing more than to throw down his position as family head and hide away in some mountain village.
“Why what?”
Jang Yu-un’s face twisted into an expression of utter bewilderment.
“……Why? Sigh. It’s always been like this. I forgot that about you.”
That she’d always been willful. But even so, this was too much.
“Why did you kill the direct bloodline of the Baekri Clan?”
Suddenly.
There was no reason to kill them whatsoever.
The Jang Clan had no vendetta with them, nor were they locked in a power struggle within the Evil Sect.
Wasn’t this the sort of thing that could spiral into a full-scale righteous versus evil confrontation?
Just killing three people?
In Gangho, no one can predict what will happen. Three deaths could grow into thirty, then thirty thousand.
That’s Gangho.
“Ah, that. Those bastards touched my son. So I killed them. How dare they lay hands on my son? Insane.”
He’d heard that the Baekri Clan had given the Yin-yang Drum to the direct line of the Sacheon Dang Family and manipulated them from behind.
So in the end, Dok Wang had killed even the head of the Baekri Clan.
“……What? Are you in your right mind? The Dang Family’s direct line is your son?”
Was she truly mad? It really seemed so. If that were actually the case…….
“Mad? How in the world would those men be my son?”
……So that’s it.
“……Then what are you even talking about?”
“Didn’t I tell you about this long ago? I think I did? That I have a son.”
“……Yes, I remember. But at the time…….”
It had sounded too absurd, so he’d simply laughed it off.
“Really……you have a son?”
“If I said I have one, then I have one. When have I ever said something that doesn’t exist?”
“……There was no such thing.”
Right, there wasn’t. Even if you dismissed it as absurd nonsense, that very absurdity had come to pass not long after.
Seven, eight years ago, perhaps?
The leader of the Sadomyeon—a coalition of Evil Sects—had become obsessed with Jang Ryeo’s face and made a grand request of the Jang Clan that she become his woman.
It was called a request, but it amounted to little different from a threat: if they refused, he would impose severe restrictions upon them.
At that time, Jang Ryeo had left the family, vowing to cure the Sadomyeon leader of his habits.
Back then, they’d even thought it fortunate—that she should leave and die out there. But who could have foreseen that she would actually return with the Sadomyeon leader’s habits thoroughly beaten out of him?
From that time onward, Jang Ryeo had become the foremost martial artist of the Evil Sect, someone no one dared to trifle with lightly.
Jang Ryeo met her brother Jang Yu-un’s gaze directly and opened her mouth.
“So here’s what I’m saying.”
……So here’s what she’s saying?
He wished desperately that she would keep those words locked behind her teeth.

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