My Father Is the Number One Under Heaven - Chapter 134

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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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Episode 134. They Are Watching
A note slipped to Yeo Un-hwi by the innkeeper during the meal, when he’d stepped outside for a moment.
It contained nothing but a location.
Taking the note, Yeo Un-hwi rose and set off at once.
He arrived at a small, dilapidated house not far from the inn.
Though no one had lived there for some time, it appeared someone maintained it occasionally—the interior was reasonably clean.
Who could it be? Who had summoned him here?
Yeo Un-hwi wiped dust from the table, then took a seat.
He spent some time surveying the room around him.
The door creaked open, and someone slipped in quietly.
Sensing the presence, Yeo Un-hwi spoke first.
His tone suggested he already knew who this was, though the figure’s face remained hidden.
“It’s been a long time.”
“I hope you’ve been well.”
The man removed his Bamboo Hat, revealing his face.
A familiar one.
A man with that characteristic bluntness, yet eyes deeper than most—sharp and penetrating.
It was Jegal Gil, the investigator of the Murim League.
Their first connection had been through matters involving the Demonic Sect and the Sarim Dan, and they’d met only rarely since the incident where Yeo Un-hwi had saved his life upon his return to the Murim League.
“Forgive me for disturbing you in the middle of the night, and during such an enjoyable gathering no less.”
“No, the timing is perfect.”
“You don’t care for drink?”
“A little enjoyment—who wouldn’t want that?”
The problem was that the Peng Estate’s warriors filling that inn seemed to believe “a little” had no place in their vocabulary when it came to drinking.
So Yeo Un-hwi was grateful that Jegal Gil had called him away.
In truth, he’d been seriously considering just slipping away from the table altogether.
“They seem like interesting people.”
“I won’t deny that.”
Jegal Gil let out a small laugh at his words and settled into the seat across from him.
Now, facing him directly, Yeo Un-hwi could see that Jegal Gil’s face had grown somewhat drawn, deepened and sharpened by something.
Recognizing this as the fruit of effort following advice he’d once given, Yeo Un-hwi felt a bittersweet smile catch in his throat, even as relief flooded through him.
“Do you hear much news from the Central Plains?”
“News? I suppose I know what others know, and remain ignorant of what they don’t.”
“Then you must have heard—this name ‘Murmyeong’ has become quite famous lately.”
“Murmyeong, yes. I’ve heard the name. Seems to be quite the remarkable fellow.”
“Indeed. From his very debut he toppled Youling Shenjun and claimed a place among the Ten Great Masters. And now, it’s said, he defeated Dang Gu-hwi, that unfilial wretch of the Sacheon Dang Family who’d become a Demonic Cultivator and slaughtered commoners—even Dang Jin-u himself couldn’t manage that feat.”
“Hmm. Is that so?”
Word certainly did travel fast.
“The Patriarch of the Sacheon Dang Family must have allowed it.”
Jegal Gil shook his head at Yeo Un-hwi’s words.
“He is indeed deliberate before a fight, but once it begins, he shows no hesitation. Regardless of kinship, having committed such horrors, the Patriarch would have wanted to handle it with greater certainty and speed.”
As expected, Jegal Gil understood Dang Jin-u’s temperament precisely.
“So this Murmyeong is even more impressive than I’d thought.”
Jegal Gil regarded Yeo Un-hwi with a faint smile, watching as he feigned ignorance with practiced ease.
“Why do you ask?”
“How does it feel? To be this mysterious master who’s set the Martial World ablaze?”
“What are you talking about?”
“You know very well what I’m talking about.”
“You’re saying I’m Murmyeong? That’s the suspicion you’re harboring now?”
“Not suspicion—certainty. I’d stake my position as an investigator on it.”
“Is this what you call an investigator’s instinct?”
“Let’s say it is.”
Yeo Un-hwi clicked his tongue at the answer, offered without a trace of doubt.
Truthfully, even Jegal Gil hadn’t suspected it at first.
But when he’d gone to investigate the scene after Youling Shenjun’s death, he’d heard accounts from three witnesses: Myeong-hyeon of Taoism, Do-il of Shaolin, and Jong-pal of Gae Bang.
Their testimony about the young man who’d killed Youling Shenjun.
Not only had he felled that legendary Ten Great Master with impossible ease—a master whom only the Twelve Supremes were thought to rival—but he’d apparently detoxified the three poisoned men when they weren’t even looking, and then vanished without a trace.
Martial Arts skills that belied his youth, his manner of speech, even the rough shape of his features.
The more Jegal Gil heard, the more naturally one man came to mind.
And that thought had swiftly become certainty.
Yeo Un-hwi was Murmyeong. Of that much, Jegal Gil was certain.
And the moment they met again, his conviction only hardened.
Jegal Gil had been staring at the table, but now he lifted his eyes once more.
His gaze had grown sharp, cutting.
“The Murim League has taken notice of Murmyeong.”
“The Murim League?”
The sudden shift in Jegal Gil’s demeanor, coupled with the weight of his words—this was no mere interest in another of the Ten Great Masters emerging—prompted Yeo Un-hwi to press further.
“Yes. They had no choice, you see.”
“What do you mean?”
At Yeo Un-hwi’s puzzled expression, Jegal Gil’s next words came as a shock.
“A year ago, something similar happened within the Murim League itself—with one of their own clan leaders.”
Yeo Un-hwi’s eyes narrowed at once.
Jegal Gil continued his account.
A year prior, one of the Murim League’s clan patriarchs had suddenly transformed into a Demonic Cultivator and gone berserk.
The devastation within the League had been immense, and though the Murim League Master himself—the Starfall Swordmaster Song Il-do—had stepped in personally, even he could not subdue the transformed man.
It had been a shock.
There was no master within the Murim League who had reached a higher realm than he.
As the damage threatened to spread beyond measure, fortune intervened—if one could call it that.
The transformed man suddenly coughed blood, underwent Blood Dissipation, and dissolved away.
The Murim League had suffered grave losses in the wake of it all.
“But why wasn’t this made public?”
An event of such magnitude, with barely a year having passed, should have left rumors still circulating.
And yet—
“They imposed absolute silence.”
It was troubling enough that one of the Murim League’s own had become a Demonic Cultivator and run amok, but the greater shame lay in this: the Murim League Master himself—one of the Ten Great Masters and the very symbol of the League’s authority—had been unable to suppress him.
The Murim League had deemed this catastrophic for their prestige and chose to bury it entirely.
For them, that incident remained merely a disaster to be forgotten.
But recently, when word of Dang Gu-hwi’s fate—the former Crown Prince of the Sacheon Dang Family—came to light, the memory resurfaced in the Murim League’s mind, and they began to watch this master called Murmyeong, who had so easily subdued Dang Gu-hwi, with keen interest.
The Murim League was astounded: a single man had accomplished what their own Master had failed to do.
What they did not understand—
—was that while Martial Arts themselves were formidable, the Heavenly Martial Divine Art was to those who carried the seeds of destruction within their bodies what sunlight was to darkness: a natural and devastating counter.
This was why Yeo Un-hwi could subdue them with relative ease.
As the sun rises and night retreats, so too did the nature of things turn in his favor.
In terms of fundamental opposition, Yeo Un-hwi held overwhelming dominance.
Even without that advantage, Dang Gu-hwi would never have been his match.
“Utterly contemptible.”
Yeo Un-hwi found himself grinding his teeth as he listened.
That men seated in such positions craved dignity and face was almost second nature—but even so, the Murim League’s concealment of what had befallen them was intolerable to him.
If they truly represented the Orthodox Faction and the Martial World, they should have made the danger known swiftly and prepared collectively for any recurrence.
Had they done so, the damage from Dang Gu-hwi’s incident might have been far less severe.
Knowledge of what came before mattered just as much as what came after.
But they had chosen otherwise.
Even in such circumstances, their first concern had been not the safety of their people, but their own prestige and standing.
How could one not find such a thing repulsive?
A cold smile settled on Yeo Un-hwi’s lips.
Jegal Gil wore the same expression.
A low breath escaped him.
Yeo Un-hwi closed his eyes, composing himself.
When he opened them again, the rage that had flickered across his features had faded, replaced once more by an easy calm.
“Valuable intelligence, that. My thanks. Though I wonder—did you come all this way simply to tell me?”
“In part, yes. I happened to have business near Hebei.”
“I see.”
“Truth be told, though I move about like this, I am hardly free. They pretend to trust me for now, but I cannot know when another watcher might be sent. Such is his nature.”
He spoke of the man who truly wielded power within the Murim League.
Jang Cheong, the First Elder of the Murim League.
Behind a gentle countenance and diminutive frame lurked something far more sinister—a viper coiled in wait.
On the surface, no one was more trusted, more esteemed both within and beyond the League’s walls. But did anyone truly understand?
That through this single man, the Murim League was rotting systematically from within?
It mattered not how many times the League Master changed.
Long ago, all the elders and those of power within the League had already fallen under his hand.
Only Jegal Mun, the Murim League’s Commander-in-Chief and Jegal Gil’s brother, stood apart from this.
Yet even he, despite possessing a keener mind than most, could not match Jang Cheong in matters of statecraft.
In the murky depths of political intrigue, he fell even further short.
So long as Jang Cheong remained, the Murim League could never truly change.
To overturn the current order, an unimaginable move was required.
A divine stratagem capable of overturning everything.
And standing before Yeo Un-hwi at this very moment was the man preparing that move.
Since the day he had been betrayed by one he considered a friend, Jegal Gil had entered Jang Cheong’s inner circle.
Suspicion was inevitable at first.
Jang Cheong laughed openly before him, claiming to trust him, while constantly assigning watchers to shadow Jegal Gil from behind.
Only recently had those watchful eyes finally begun to withdraw.
At last, Jang Cheong had truly begun to trust him.
Even so, caution could not be abandoned.
This man was not one to be taken lightly.
No one would understand.
Perhaps some would even curse him as a turncoat, seeing how he appeared now.
But Yeo Un-hwi harbored no doubt that this man would play the most critical role of all in cleansing and renewing the Murim League from within.
Of course, the path to that end would be long and lonely—a trial of endurance few could fathom.
“Is what you set out to accomplish progressing well?”
“I am working toward it. Though I suspect I may not deliver disappointing news.”
Jegal Gil’s eyes gleamed.
For a man as cautious as Jegal Gil, his words carried remarkable confidence.
He was not one to speak so rashly without foundation.
If he said so, then surely it would be so.
Yeo Un-hwi nodded quietly.
“Should you need my aid in anything, speak freely.”
“I require nothing at present.”
“Then all is well.”
“Though… perhaps one day I may need to impose upon you after all.”
“I shall be ready.”
For a moment, the two men’s eyes met.
Though they had known each other only briefly, a deep camaraderie flowed between them.
Even Jegal Gil could not fully fathom why.
Having said what needed to be said, Jegal Gil prepared to depart.
He meant to return before his absence could arouse suspicion.
Then, as he turned to go, he spoke once more to Yeo Un-hwi.
“I must say again—the Murmyeong is drawing the gaze of the Murim League and the wider martial world of the Central Plains.”
……
“Which means that while your identity may have remained hidden until now, concealing it may prove far more difficult going forward.”
“That much may be true.”
“It would be prudent to prepare for that day in advance.”
“I appreciate the counsel.”
Watching Yeo Un-hwi accept the advice with such ease, Jegal Gil let out a hollow laugh.
Such unshakeable confidence.
He could only marvel at it.
Who in the current martial world could make this man tremble?
Would it not take one of the Twelve Supremes?
Even that, Jegal Gil thought, might not be enough.
At such a young age, he had already earned a place among the Ten Great Masters, and beyond that, he had even felled a Demonic Cultivator that the Ten Great Masters themselves could not overcome.
This was unprecedented.
Perhaps the man who might one day become the greatest master in all the martial world stood before him now.
Suddenly, Jegal Gil felt a strange desire.
To see what would become of the world when this man stood at the pinnacle of the martial realm.
“Then I shall take my leave. Until we meet again.”
With that, Jegal Gil departed.
……
Left alone, Yeo Un-hwi’s eyes grew distant.
Through the window of the humble dwelling, the distant lights of an inn flickered where the Peng Estate’s warriors gathered in their revelry.

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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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