Murim Login - Chapter 177

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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 177
Why hadn’t I seen it?
Perhaps it was faith in a disciple I’d raised like my own flesh and blood, or perhaps it was indifference. Yet on that day, Jang Cheon’s body, climbing the mountain with unsteady steps, unmistakably carried the scent of blood.
‘Where have you been?’
‘Ah, Master.’
My disciple’s eyes gleamed with a reddish hue—part intoxication, part something else entirely.
‘I visited the Lower Village briefly. My heart has been restless lately, so I indulged in a cup of wine.’
‘Wine, you say. Nothing more?’
‘It would be embarrassing to speak of it myself. Haha! I apologize for showing you such a state.’
The pungent musk that courtesans wore assaulted my nostrils. But it was merely a veil drawn to conceal the truth.
Jeok Cheon-gang detected the faint scent of blood hidden beneath that curtain—the smell of death he’d long forgotten since the Great Hall Tournament, the reek of a murderer.
‘Did you go to the Giru?’
‘As expected, I cannot deceive you, Master. Yes, this unworthy disciple’s heart was troubled, and I succumbed to carnal desire.’
The disciple I faced after so long had become an entirely different person.
From a taciturn boy devoid of laughter, he’d transformed into a brazen murderer who concealed his killings without a trace of guilt.
‘But what brings you out on such a late night? Have you made progress in your secluded training?’
‘It’s been so long since I’ve seen your face. I was waiting for you.’
He’d slaughtered dozens of innocent civilians in unspeakable ways.
A crime that heaven and earth alike would condemn. As his master, I should have severed his meridians and sealed his dantian immediately.
But.
‘I see. It’s truly wonderful to see you like this, Master.’
At the sight of Jang Cheon’s gentle smile, Jeok Cheon-gang found himself speechless. Neither anger nor betrayal stirred within him. Instead, something deep within his chest rose up, leaving only a hollow ache.
In the end, there was only one thing he could say.
‘The night grows late. Rest now.’
Jin Tae-kyung, who had been listening to Jeok Cheon-gang’s account, asked with an expression of disbelief.
“Surely that wasn’t the end of it?”
“I wanted to believe in that child.”
“But you already knew everything. That Jo Pil—or rather, Jang Cheon—was lying.”
“I knew.”
“Yet you let him go?”
“Yes, even so.”
The aged voice continued.
“Do you have blood relatives?”
“I do.”
“I have none. In my earliest memories, I was always alone, and so was he.”
Jeok Cheon-gang gazed down at his own hands. Age spots and wrinkles covered them, layers of time accumulated upon their surface.
“My master was a stern man. His training was harsh and painful, yet as a child, I cherished even that. Someone thought of me, and we were together—that brought me joy. My master was the only person I could rely upon.”
But my time with my master was brief. I was left alone again, and loneliness slowly dulled with the passage of years.
Until I met a child struggling in the Market Street to protect a single dumpling.
“That child had no one but me to depend on. Even if all the world pointed fingers, I alone had to believe in him.”
At some point, Jang Cheon became far more than a mere disciple to Jeok Cheon-gang.
He was his only son, his grandson. Though their blood did not mingle, the affection between them surpassed that of kinship.
“But what that boy had done was far too horrific. I had to make him stop. By any means necessary.”
Before that, I wanted to witness my disciple’s atrocities with my own eyes.
The fact that Chang Cheon Geom-wang had come in person meant all circumstantial and material evidence was already in place, but that was not enough.
“So I began to follow him in secret.”
From that day forward, I pursued my disciple’s shadow. It was easy to evade the notice of Jang Cheon, who had yet to break through the wall of the Peak Realm.
Once, twice, ten times—with each successive surveillance, the despair I had felt at first grew thinner.
Jang Cheon was nothing more than a dissolute wastrel, stopping by Giru to drink and embrace women like any other. He would stumble back to his hovel reeking of wine, then return as a martial artist and devote himself earnestly to training.
Everything appeared utterly without flaw.
“Suddenly, a thought occurred to me. What if there had been some mistake? What if the Namgung Clan and Chang Cheon Geom-wang had simply misjudged him?”
Jin Tae-kyung spoke with an expression of utter disbelief.
“In my opinion, it seems Jeok Dae-hyup may have misjudged him.”
Jeok Cheon-gang laughed hollowly.
“Yes, that’s what I thought. I was foolishly trying to deny it.”
“So, did you verify it yourself?”
….
Jeok Cheon-gang drank from the bottle of liquor without a word.
The ceiling blurred not from the potency of the drink, but from the vivid memories of that day flooding back.
* * *
Thud, thud, thud.
In a dark alley of the Red Light District shrouded in thick darkness. Stifled moans and sprays of blood gushing forth.
The silhouette of the Masked Figure wielding a sharp blade, piercing and thrusting into someone’s limbs, was more familiar than anyone else’s—and yet more alien than ever before.
‘…Cheon.’
At my soft call, the hand gripping the blade stiffened. The Masked Figure slowly turned, and our eyes met.
The disciple’s eyes, meeting his master after so long, curved like crescents.
‘Ah, Master.’
‘What… what are you doing right now?’
‘What am I doing? Exactly what you see.’
Jang Cheon grinned wickedly and drove the blade downward. Thud, thud, thud. The middle-aged man, bound at the limbs, writhed in agony.
‘Stop this instant!’
‘Why should I stop?’
‘…What… what did you just say?’
‘Since I’ve been out, I’ve seen all manner of wretches running about. Bandits puffed up with pride in their mediocre martial arts, merchants grown fat with flesh, and women with nothing to sell but their bodies. It’s a carnival of fools.’
Jang Cheon smiled with ghastly pallor.
‘This one is merely one among them. What harm is there in killing one such creature? He lives without meaning—nothing but a two-legged beast.’
Everything felt like a dream to me. The hope I had harbored while watching my disciple for the past four months evaporated like bubbles.
‘Why… why do you do such things?’
‘Because I am strong.’
Jang Cheon continued with an exhilarated voice.
‘The strong reign supreme. Did your master not teach you? The Murim—nay, the world itself—is such a place. The weak perish at the hands of the strong.’
‘You killed innocent people for such a trivial reason?’
‘Innocent, you say? How would you know such a thing, Master?’
‘Then tell me—what grave sin did those you murdered commit?’
I wished they had been criminals deserving of death.
I wished they had been unscrupulous merchants who bled the common folk dry, or ruthless brigands who killed without hesitation—not simple, honest villagers who knew nothing of the world’s cruelty and lived like oxen.
But…
‘I wouldn’t know, Master.’
‘…!’
‘After all, who lives without sin? They were simply unfortunate. They happened to catch my eye, that’s all. This one here is no different.’
Jeok Cheon-gang felt the world spin before his eyes.
The disciple he loved as dearly as his own flesh and blood had already crossed a river from which none return.
Those who cross to the far bank never come back. They become blood-soaked demons of slaughter, destined to live out their days in that crimson hell.
‘Cheon.’
‘Yes, Master.’
The gaunt face of a child he had found on Market Street a decade ago overlapped with the visage of a youth drenched in blood.
‘What on earth has made you this way?’
‘What do you mean, Master?’
‘You were not like this. The weak perish at the hands of the strong? Have you forgotten the boy who once clawed and fought desperately just to survive?’
‘I haven’t forgotten. That’s precisely why I am who I am now.’
‘No. You were kind and sincere…’
‘Master.’
Jang Cheon cut off his master’s words with a soft voice.
A disciple who had never once interrupted or contradicted his teacher—yet now, mockery dripped openly from Jang Cheon’s lips.
‘I remember clearly the day we first met. After days of hunger wandering Market Street, I found a dumpling caked in dirt. Even as others like me trampled it, I shoved it into my mouth.’
‘Yes, to survive. You were once weak too—why can’t you remember that?’
Jang Cheon’s mouth twisted.
‘Wang Pal, Hong So-chil, So Woo-pyung.’
‘…?’
‘Three of the fifteen who tried to steal my dumpling. Unfortunately, the others are already dead.’
Three names spilled from his disciple’s lips.
Their meaning was unmistakable. They no longer walked this world, and in their final moments, they must have endured unspeakable agony.
‘They never remembered me, but I never forgot them—not for a single day. That day, chewing on that dirt-covered dumpling, I understood. This is the world. The weak are trampled; the strong do the trampling. So I decided I would become strong. I would claim the privileges of the strong.’
As Jang Cheon spoke his ancient vow in that desolate voice, Jeok Cheon-gang finally understood.
‘You… you are…’
‘Yes. I have never changed, Master. Not once since the day we first met.’
His white teeth gleamed in the darkness. Jang Cheon was laughing softly.
‘It was exhilarating. At first they begged for their lives, then they wailed for death. When silence finally came, an emptiness gnawed at my chest. Even drowning myself in wine at the Giru or lying with women couldn’t fill that void.’
He was born a creature of slaughter—a killing star incarnate.
Only murder could fill that emptiness. Until his final breath, Jang Cheon would never stop killing.
‘The timing was perfect. My master was focused on his cultivation and neglected me, which allowed me to act freely.’
Jeok Cheon-gang wanted nothing more than to cover his ears. To block out the sound, close his eyes, and erase today’s memories from his mind.
His body trembled with betrayal and rage toward the disciple he had nurtured with the affection of blood kinship.
Yet what tormented him most was the lingering affection he still held for that same disciple.
‘Of course, my heart wasn’t at ease either. Was it four months ago? When I returned after handling matters, my master was waiting. I realized I’d been discovered when I saw him behave differently than usual.’
‘Enough.’
‘My master, who trusted me implicitly, would never have followed me of his own accord. Someone must have informed him—ah, it was surely the Namgung Clan.’
‘I said silence!’
A tremendous wave of energy crashed forth. Jang Cheon’s eyes widened at the fury of his master, something he had never witnessed before.
‘Master?’
‘You wretch! How dare you call me master with that mouth! Have you still not grasped what you have done?’
‘Why do you speak so? Surely you don’t intend to cast aside your only disciple over something so trivial?’
‘Trivial? Did you just call this trivial?’
‘To me, you are as a father. I believed that even if all the world condemned my faults, you would understand. Because you are my father.’
Father. A word he had longed so desperately to hear.
Jeok Cheon-gang clenched his teeth.
‘You are wrong.’
‘Wrong, you say?’
Jang Cheon smiled faintly.
‘Then why do you not strike me down this instant? There have been countless opportunities these past four months, and even now.’
‘That is—’
‘Am I mistaken in what I say?’
Jeok Cheon-gang found himself speechless. Every word from Jang Cheon’s mouth was truth. He had deliberately turned away from reality, attempted to justify it.
Because he wanted so desperately to believe in his disciple.
It was a long time before he spoke again.
‘I will sever your meridians.’
‘My meridians, and then?’
‘I will seal your dantian. For the remainder of your life, you will spend it in repentance for your crimes.’
‘Wall-facing meditation until death. The very thought is horrifying.’
Yet contrary to his words, Jang Cheon’s face was filled with laughter.
‘But has the sect’s code of discipline perhaps changed while this unworthy disciple was distracted? I was under the impression that such transgressions warrant immediate execution without question.’
‘…This is my final mercy. Now release him at once and step back.’
Jang Cheon blinked as though he had forgotten something important.
In his arms, a middle-aged man drenched entirely in blood continued to draw labored breaths.
‘Ah, this one. How could I forget.’
A wet sound. A spray of blood.
Jeok Cheon-gang stared at the geyser of blood with trembling eyes.
A hand that did not hesitate for even an instant. The man with his throat severed convulsed once, then his breathing ceased.
‘Is this your answer?’
‘It is already too late. Even if he lived, he would spend his remaining years as a cripple. Is it not more merciful to end him cleanly?’
‘You are… no longer the child I once knew.’
‘I am exactly the child you knew, Master. You were simply mistaken from the beginning.’
‘Enough. Your misdeeds end today.’
‘Are you truly planning to cripple me and confine me to wall-facing meditation for the rest of my life?’
A faint tremor of fear surfaced across my disciple’s face.
Jeok Cheon-gang clenched his fists so tightly that blood seeped from his palms. Just one move—a single strike—and I could erase Jang Cheon from this world.
Yet I knew I could never do it.
Severing his meridians, destroying his martial arts, and imprisoning him were the only methods available to me.
‘Do you regret it?’
‘Regret, you say?’
‘Yes. Regret.’
Nothing would change, but I wanted to hear it from his own lips.
Yet in the next moment, fear vanished from Jang Cheon’s face as if washed away.
‘I am relieved.’
‘What?’
‘I could not see or hear you, but I knew you were watching over me these past four months. So why would I commit such acts before your eyes?’
Jang Cheon’s face reflected in Jeok Cheon-gang’s vacant eyes. He continued with an ease that belied the moment.
‘You cannot kill me, Master. Even if I slew hundreds instead of tens, it would make no difference. Before I depart, I wanted to confirm that one last time.’
‘Depart? What do you mean?’
‘There are fathers who blame their children for their faults, but nowhere in this world exists a father who kills his own child with his own hands.’
‘…!’
‘Thank you, Master. For raising me not merely as a disciple, but as a son. For striving to keep even such a son alive until the very end. Because of you, the one path to survival has opened before me.’
Jang Cheon offered a deep bow to Jeok Cheon-gang, who had frozen as though his breath had stopped.
When he raised his head again, a small white porcelain vial rested between his lips.
‘Bone-Dissolving Powder.’
Bone-Dissolving Powder—a deadly toxin that melts flesh and bone alike.
No matter how small the amount, if it shatters within the mouth, not even a celestial immortal could save him.
Jeok Cheon-gang’s roar shattered the silence.
‘Jang Cheon! You bastard!’
‘The bow I just offered was… my final farewell. I will depart on this path. I will go far and never return.’
‘Do you think I will simply let you go?’
‘Then kill me. That is the only way.’
‘…!’
‘Kill me.’
Kill me. Those were my disciple’s final words.
* * *
Jeok Cheon-gang blinked. The ceiling had been hazy for some time now, and something was trickling down his cheeks.
“This Inn is decrepit. The roof leaks.”
It was a winter night, one day before the First Day of the Year.

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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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