Murim School Record - Chapter 50

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

Chapter 50: Clean-Up Operation (Part 1)

“S-Seo… Seo Dang Cheon, sir.”
There was no face, but it was unmistakably Seo Woo Don.
It made no sense.
This ruthless master lay dead in his own quarters, his face obliterated.

The Emergency Bell rang out.
The warriors practicing their forms in the Martial Training Ground halted at the unfamiliar sound, their attention snapping toward the tolling bell.
The senior officers scattered at once, each rushing in different directions.
They converged on the Yuseong Pavilion.
A dozen officers crowded in, gasping at the sight of Yeo Dang Cheon’s body—or what remained of it, the face gone.
Thud-thud.
Heavy footfalls echoed through the hall, and the officers who had arrived first parted instinctively to clear a path.
Wi Ji Gwang.
He walked through the crowd and stood over the corpse, which lay whole and arranged on the floor.
His gaze fixed on two points: the absent face and the right wrist.
Everything else on the body remained intact.
“Turn it over.”
One of the officers quickly flipped the body.
The back was clean.
“Return it to its original position.”
The corpse was laid face-up again.
Wi Ji Gwang’s brow furrowed as he stared down at it for a long time.
“What do you make of it?”
No one spoke.
Then Jong Ri Gyun broke the silence.
“I cannot identify the killer’s martial technique from the body. The most likely areas where traces of the technique would remain are the right hand and the face.”
Wi Ji Gwang listened without interruption.
“Yet those are the only parts missing.”
“So the only sections of the body that could have preserved the killer’s technique have been destroyed?”
“That appears to be the case.”
“The wrist fracture and the neck wound are both extraordinarily rough. That suggests no weapon was used, does it not?”
“This old man reaches the same conclusion.”
Jong Ri Gyun continued speaking.
“Jong, elder!”
“Yes, Clan Master!”
A sharp intake of breath.
A flinch.
Those gathered reacted as if struck by the title Jong Ri Gyun had used in his reply.
That he would become the next Clan Master had been obvious, but this was the first time the formal title had been spoken aloud in an official moment.
Wi Ji Gwang flinched for an instant as well, but he swallowed lightly, his expression showing no great displeasure.
“In all the Jianghu, is there a soul capable of beating the Mo Yong Clan’s Yuseong Bloodline Dang Cheon to death so utterly with bare-handed martial strength?”
“The world is vast, so none can say never—but among those I recall, I know of no such figure.”
One of the Inner Circle Members spoke with absolute certainty.
It was a statement that rang true.
Whatever the killer’s skill, Yeo Dang Cheon’s martial prowess had been formidable.
Moreover, he was cunning, and these gathered here could not imagine him falling so stupidly. That was the collective conviction in this room.
Brutality of hand was, first and foremost, an expression grounded in strength.
What was a weak martial artist’s cruelty but the work of a back-alley butcher?
Yeo Dang Cheon was no butcher.
He was the Mo Yong Clan’s apex.
“Former Dang Cheon.”
A man in black stepped forward, appearing to be around forty, with a sharp, angular face and a lean frame.
His bearing was stern and his body spare.
Ghost Patrol Master Jeon Dok Ban, who oversaw the outer security of the Mo Yong Clan.
“How many outsiders visited the main house today?”
“I shall summon Escort Chief O Pan at once.”
Whoosh!
Jeon Dok Ban vanished from the room like lightning.
Wi Ji Gwang swept his gaze across the ruined chamber.
Furniture and tables lay shattered, cracks spider-webbing across portions of the walls.
Anyone could see that a fierce battle had erupted here.
Had it been one-sided, the room could never have been torn apart like this.
The destruction spoke of an evenly matched struggle.
And yet the outcome looked entirely one-sided.
He lifted his head to study Jong Ri Gyun, whose face bore the same expression of bewilderment—a riddle that simply would not resolve.

Back in his quarters, Wi Ji Gwang studied a ledger.
It contained the records of every outsider who had visited the Mo Yong Clan since dawn that day.
Most were warriors.
Of course, all were figures with close ties to the clan, and leaders of minor martial houses who shared their cause.
No matter how many times he reviewed the list, he could find no one who appeared to have killed Yeo Dang Cheon and slipped away.
Could it have been an inside job?
Why not?
But anyone capable of eliminating Yeo Dang Cheon so thoroughly would need to be Protector Rank.
More than that—someone who could dispatch him so swiftly that no one outside heard the sounds of struggle might be even beyond that.
If anyone fit the bill, it would be Jong Ri Gyun.
Yet he could not suspect Jong Ri Gyun.
Snap.
His gaze fixed suddenly on one section of the ledger.

‘Jeoksan Pyoguk—two escort carriages entered.’

They had come and gone.

‘All twelve departed, including the Escort Chief.’

The same number who had come had left.
Jeoksan Pyoguk.
A name far too familiar.
“Jong Jang Lo.”
“Yes, Clan Master?”
“You’ve completely resolved that matter from before, haven’t you?”
“Entirely, sir.”
The fact that they never found a body remained an irritant, but they had done all that could be done.
They had combed every inch of Song Rim Won and its surroundings, and his subordinates had agreed that in these circumstances, any talk of survival was senseless.
“Hmm.”
Wi Ji Gwang’s eyes remained fixed on the entry and exit records of the Jeoksan Pyoguk escort carriages.
Something nagged at him.
He couldn’t identify what it was.
But it unsettled him.

He had returned to the escort station.
The moment he arrived, a warrior approached and said that Station Master Dan Hu Jam was requesting his presence.
Yi Mo Baek left the escort warriors to rest in their quarters, then went alone to meet Dan Hu Jam.
“It’s been a long time.”
Upon entering Dan Hu Jam’s quarters, a warrior stood there with arms crossed.
His name was Sa Yul.
Though he was said to be not yet forty, it was during one of Dan Hu Jam’s runs with a merchant vessel belonging to Jeoksan Pyoguk through Dong Young that they had encountered a small boat near Namhae, battered by a squall and on the verge of capsizing.
A boatman was aboard, fighting with all his might to keep the vessel steady, though it seemed he would not be able to hold much longer.
Dan Hu Jam immediately ordered his men to board the small craft and haul the man aboard their merchant ship.
The man had given his name as Sa Yul.
At his waist hung a sword, and it was remarkably thin.
A very thin sword—it seemed to be only half the length of swords in Joong Won.
He claimed to be a true disciple of a single school of martial arts.
Namhae Geomgak.
There was a song that had drifted through the Jianghu since ancient times.
Somewhere in Namhae, it said, there existed a sword school where one person ruled alone.
The swordsmanship there was swift and merciless.
Devastatingly fast.
Stripping away all variation and weight, pouring everything into pure speed—the Death Sentence Flash.
Sa Yul acknowledged him with a slight curl of his lips.
Yi Mo Baek climbed the steps and vanished into the hall.

He entered Dan Hu Jam’s quarters.
By coincidence, the administrator Dong Bang In was just receiving Dan Hu Jam’s approval on documents.
After reviewing the stacked papers, Dan Hu Jam signed them with his brush.
He waited for some time, and once all the approvals were finished, Dong Bang In turned around with papers tucked under his arm.
“You’ve come?”
He was seventy this year.
He was the man who had built the Jeoksan Pyoguk alongside Dan Hu Jam.
The only person Dan Hu Jam truly trusted.
“I’ll take a look and go.”
“I’ll treat you to a drink of wine soon.”
“You’re buying? Then I must have it.”
He left the room with a light laugh.
Thud!
The door closed, and Dan Hu Jam rose and walked to the round table, where he sat.
“Have a seat.”
Only then did Yi Mo Baek sit down across from him.
“How was this journey?”
Dan Hu Jam said that since the founding of the Jeoksan Pyoguk, he had never shed so much blood as he had recently.
This meant the political situation in the Jianghu was becoming unstable.
The rules and order that had been drawn taut were beginning to crumble.
Those rules and order meant the Murim Alliance.
No one could know how the future of the Jianghu would unfold.
Though his time as an Escort Chief of the Jeoksan Pyoguk was not long, Yi Mo Baek had faced the most dangers in that short span.
“I was fortunate.”
“I like that about you. Anyone could say they broke through the crisis because they had skill, but you always say you lived by good fortune. Remarkable. It seems simple, but it’s terribly difficult to speak that way.”
Then he opened the drawer of the table and pulled out a sealed letter, which he handed over.
Though it was laid out flat, the creases were still vivid, as if it had been crumpled for a long time and only recently smoothed.
Whoosh!
Yi Mo Baek withdrew the letter from the envelope and read it.

‘To the respected Scholar Wi Ji Gwang. I am ashamed that you regard this Buk Mo so highly. In this turbulent age when the realm is in chaos, how could I dare refuse when you seek my humble skills? Within days, I shall come to a good conclusion and visit you at Mak Gan Mountain. Respectfully, Buk Mu Eul.’

Yi Mo Baek read it once more.
Then he lifted his head and asked.
“What is this?”
Beyond knowing that someone named Buk Mu Eul was sending a letter to Wi Ji Gwang, it was difficult to grasp the meaning of the contents.
“The Buk family—does nothing come to mind?”
Yi Mo Baek tilted his head in confusion.
“He could be called the supreme master of poison bullet manufacture.”
Gasp!
Yi Mo Baek was startled.
The moment the words poison bullet manufacture came to mind, a certain person’s reputation surfaced.
Neither a righteous sect nor a demonic one.
He would craft poison bullets for anyone, regardless of status or position, as long as they paid.
The poison family was the Sichuan Dang Clan, and the fire family was the Hwa Clan in Hyeong San.
The Endless Mountain Bomb crafted by the Hwa Clan was called the finest fire device in Joong Won and possessed tremendous destructive power.
In the midst of this, someone appeared long ago who styled himself the Bomb Emperor.
Not long after his emergence, countless people had lost their lives to his fire devices.
What makes his fire devices truly terrifying isn’t merely the force of the explosions—it’s the poison they carry.
Poison Bullets, as they’re called.
Even the Sichuan Dang Clan, for all their centuries of expertise in toxins, had tried countless times to blend poison with gunpowder without success.
Survive the blast, and the poison will still bring you down.
The gravest of all evils.
Because of his Poison Bullets—more ruthless than any villain’s—the Murim Alliance took the unprecedented step of naming him a Murim Public Enemy.
As the Murim Alliance’s first-ever public enemy, hunted by every faction at once, he vanished overnight—whether from fear or calculation, no one knew.
They pursued him with burning eyes, but he’d simply disappeared into shadow.
Now this letter confirmed he’d surfaced again.
“How did you come by this?”
That was the burning question.
“In Gansu Province Wu Wei, there’s a small escort company called the Yong Bi Dan. All they do is transport long-distance cargo through the Silk Road to Seo Yeok, Cheon Chuk, and beyond—and they handle more of our goods than anyone else.”
“A subcontractor of the Jeoksan Pyoguk, then.”
“Precisely. Before crossing Tian Shan, there was a brawl at an inn in a place called Ta Ong. Sixteen of the Yong Bi Dan’s escort warriors were killed—and they lost some two dozen men. The other side lost about ten of their own.”
Yi Mo Baek’s eyes gleamed.
“You’re suggesting these could be followers of Buk Mu Eul, heading to the Mo Yong Clan with this letter?”
“Exactly so.”
Yi Mo Baek studied the letter again as Dan Hu Jam continued.
“A direct assault wouldn’t be without merit, but it’s clear we’d suffer heavy losses, and you’d face considerable hardship in the process.”
Seizing control of the Mo Yong Clan would come at a steep price.
“It would, yes.”
“Facing Buk Mu Eul won’t be easy, but wouldn’t it be simpler than a direct confrontation with Wi Ji Gwang?”
Dan Hu Jam’s meaning was plain.
Since Buk Mu Eul was trying to reach for Wi Ji Gwang’s hand, intercept him before he did.
In other words—if you become Buk Mu Eul and approach the Mo Yong Clan, wouldn’t that be far smoother?
To catch a tiger, you must enter the tiger’s den.
But you cannot simply walk in announcing yourself a tiger hunter.
Yi Mo Baek said nothing and looked at the letter once more.
“I haven’t the skill to craft even common fire bombs, let alone Poison Bullets. To pull off a deception, I’d need to convincingly mimic at least some part of his craft—wouldn’t I?”
Dan Hu Jam laughed.

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