My Father Is the Number One Under Heaven - Chapter 72

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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 72. Cease Operations
The sun rose, and morning came.
Jegal Gil and his party assumed they would have an equally busy day ahead, consumed with investigating the incident.
But then,
“The investigation is complete. Everyone, prepare to return to the Alliance.”
“What? But… why so soon?”
The party members, who had naturally assumed they would stay several more days, could not help but be bewildered.
They suggested staying one more day, claiming their travel fatigue had not yet lifted, but Jegal Gil shook his head with finality.
“We’ve finished all our business here. There’s no point in lingering and imposing further. We should head back at once. If you need rest, you can take it at the Alliance.”
“Sigh. Yes, yes. Who would dare argue with the Inspector? Everyone heard that? Let’s move quickly.”
The party, who knew Jegal Gil’s temperament better than anyone, wasted no time with complaint and swiftly began their preparations to depart with him.
“Hm? Leaving already?”
In the study of the Patriarch at the Peng Family Residence.
Peng Mugang spoke with a puzzled expression.
Jegal Gil nodded in response.
“Yes. The investigation is finished, and there is nothing more to uncover. There would be little point in remaining. We have other matters that require our attention.”
“I see. Is that so?”
Peng Mugang regarded Jegal Gil quietly for a moment, then nodded.
“Very well. Travel safely, then.”
“Thank you, Patriarch. It has been an honor to meet you.”
With that, Jegal Gil completed his farewell and stepped outside.
Peng Sejin was waiting for him there.
“Why such haste? I would have hoped you might rest for at least another day, regardless.”
“Indeed, my thoughts exactly.”
A member of Jegal Gil’s party, standing behind him, muttered in agreement.
Then Jegal Gil gave a small laugh and spoke.
“You have aided us greatly throughout the investigation, Crown Prince. I hope you remain in good health until we meet again.”
Jegal Gil expressed his gratitude sincerely.
Peng Sejin smiled in return and nodded.
“You honor me. You have had much difficulty. Safe travels to you.”
After departing from the Peng Family Residence with his party, Jegal Gil walked for some time before suddenly turning to look back.
There.
In the distance, he saw ‘him’ gazing quietly in this direction.
Jegal Gil offered a light salute toward that figure, then continued on his way.
The road ahead was still long.
Yet his expression still seemed somehow complicated.
As though his heart had not yet made its decision.
Hmm.
Yeo Un-hui, watching Jegal Gil and his party disappear into the distance, stood lost in thought.
***
Murim Alliance Leader’s Hall.
“You’ve returned sooner than expected. Well then—did the investigation yield any results?”
“Upon investigation, we found nothing inconsistent with what was already known.”
“I see. Is that so?”
Song Il-do, the Leader of the Murim Alliance, nodded at Jegal Gil’s report.
“If that is your conclusion, then it must be so. Understood. You have labored well. You may withdraw.”
“Yes.”
Jegal Gil exchanged a brief glance with his older brother, Jegal Mun, before exiting the Leader’s Hall.
“So in the end, the Sarin Group made their final stand against those vile Demonic Teaching dogs and perished in battle.”
The elders of the Murim Alliance who were present began to speak, their faces heavy with regret.
“How lamentable yet admirable those young ones were.”
“Such precious talent—the very future pillars of our Orthodox Sect’s martial world—gone in such futility. Truly, it is tragic. Most tragic indeed.”
Hearing the elders’ words, Song Il-do also released a deep sigh.
“We must remember the name of the Sarin Group for a long time to come. Though they were but young, they have served as exemplars for all of the Orthodox Sect’s martial world.”
“Yes, Leader!”
All bowed their heads in answer to Song Il-do’s words.
Meanwhile, Jegal Mun, the supreme commander of the Murim Alliance, gazed with a strange expression toward the place where his younger brother had disappeared.
And shortly after, Jegal Mun made his way toward the room where his younger brother Jegal Gil stayed.
“Brother.”
“You have traveled far and endured much hardship.”
“No.”
“Still, Gil. Is it truly the case? There was nothing else, no other facts at all?”
Jegal Mun patted his younger brother’s shoulder lightly and broached the real matter.
He was certain there had to be something more to this incident.
That was precisely why he had recommended his younger brother Jegal Gil and sent him out to investigate.
“Of course I trust your investigation without doubt, but something troubles me about it. Are you certain the Sarin Group truly fought the Black Slaughter Corps and met mutual destruction?”
Jegal Mun fixed his gaze directly on his younger brother as he asked.
Jegal Gil nodded without the slightest hesitation.
“Remarkably, it was true, brother. And I found no other circumstances of note.”
“Is that so.”
“Yes. Since considerable time had passed, there was only so much investigation I could conduct. Thus I hastened my return.”
Jegal Mun studied his younger brother’s eyes for a long moment after his reply, then slowly nodded.
“I see. So it was that way. Well, if that is your finding, then so it shall be. Very well. I will record the matter as such. You have worked hard.”
“Not at all. There was hardly anything arduous about it.”
“Ha, you rascal. Yes then, rest yourself. I shall arrange a separate meal for us soon.”
“Yes, brother.”
Jegal Mun left the room shortly after.
A deep sigh escaped from Jegal Gil’s lips.
‘I’ve lost my mind. I’ve truly lost it.’
Cracks formed across his stolid face.
It was the first time.
The first time he had lied to his older brother.
Though he had pushed through with the resolve not to be discovered, it sat poorly with him nonetheless.
Yet—
‘I beg your pardon, brother. I have no choice.’
What he was about to undertake was exceedingly dangerous.
He could not afford to entangle his brother Jegal Mun in such a perilous enterprise.
Jegal Gil rose slowly from his seat and pressed a particular section of the wall in his chamber.
What had appeared to be an ordinary wall swung open, revealing several bundles of documents hidden within.
These were records of malfeasance Jegal Gil had compiled against several of the Murim Alliance elders.
One of them contained evidence that could unleash enormous repercussions.
It was documentation proving that one of the Murim Alliance elders was selling the Alliance’s most closely guarded secrets to the Demonic Sect Alliance.
That elder was Jang Cheong, the Senior Elder of the Murim Alliance.
Who would believe it?
That he, respected by more of the Alliance’s members than anyone else, had begun the Alliance’s slow decay the moment he became Senior Elder—who could accept such a truth?
Jegal Gil had determined that Jang Cheong was the very poison that had to be excised from the Murim Alliance.
But this alone was insufficient.
More conclusive evidence was needed.
If he exposed the matter prematurely, only his own name would be dragged through mud.
And the Murim Alliance—this rotting corpse—would continue its usual motions as though nothing had happened.
So he had been confining himself to his quarters, seeking more irrefutable proof. Yet no clear method revealed itself no matter what he attempted.
Jang Cheong was no easy adversary.
Exhale.
Jegal Gil laid the bundle of documents he had gathered thus far upon his desk and examined them one by one.
The road ahead remained long—far too long.
Following his current approach, at any rate.
Then what could he do?
Just then—
“Ho, ho. Hidden away in that spot, you say? I could never have imagined.”
“Who—who are you!”
As Jegal Gil, startled by the voice suddenly emerging from behind him, turned to look back,
Tap. Tap-tap.
‘How careless!’
With his guard completely down, his vital points were struck and suppressed.
Jegal Gil found himself unable to speak or move.
The fact that he had grown complacent within the Murim Alliance, assuming such a thing could never occur here, weighed heavily on him.
“Welcome back from your long journey, friend.”
“…!”
Jegal Gil’s eyes widened.
The intruder was his peer—someone who had become an investigator at the same time he had.
Even a friend he’d occasionally meet with, someone he’d believed trustworthy enough to confide in—that very person.
‘How? You?’
Jegal Gil’s eyes blazed with disbelief and fury as he glared at the man.
“Oh, don’t look at me like that.”
The man grinned with unbearable shamelessness.
As though mocking Jegal Gil for ever having considered him a friend.
“You think I wanted this? If you’d just kept your mouth shut about that pointless investigation, none of this would’ve happened. I’ve belonged to the First Elder from the start.”
Jegal Gil had known the First Elder had people throughout the Murim Alliance, but to discover that one of the precious few he’d trusted was among them—the blow cut deep.
It was infuriating beyond measure.
He’d been a fool.
He should never have trusted anyone.
“Today, unfortunately for you, you’ll be found dead from overwork. You’ll have a seizure in your sleep and suffocate.”
The man drew something from his robes.
“This is Paralysis Poison—it’ll numb your mouth and throat just long enough. Of course, I’m using an extremely small amount, so no investigation will ever detect it.”
The man chuckled with genuine delight.
“Of course, your brother will grieve terribly. Kekeke. I do look forward to seeing that noble face of his grow so forlorn.”
He laughed darkly.
“But don’t worry. Truth is, your brother won’t last much longer either. From what I gather, the plan is to dispose of him before the year’s end. They intend to make him suffer with a vicious poison, wasting away slowly. Kekeke.”
“……!”
Confronted with the utterly depraved nature of the man he’d called friend, and hearing of his brother’s fate, Jegal Gil felt tears of blood prick his eyes.
How could these vermin call themselves Orthodox? How could they! These dogs!
“Hnnngh……!”
Though no sound escaped his throat and his body lay paralyzed, Jegal Gil trembled with rage.
“Kekeke! You know, I really hated you. Always acting so superior, so noble and refined in everything you did—it made me sick. To think I get to finish you myself, do you know how happy that makes me? Hmm?”
I thought of you as a true friend. Truly.
Jegal Gil felt a wave of bitter rage and despair crash over him, and then, slowly, he closed his eyes.
It was over. Who could he trust now?
He would never be able to trust anyone again.
‘Become cunning. Like a serpent. More than even the wicked.’
In that moment, words spoken to him by someone else surfaced in his mind.
And then, that person’s face.
Yes. Perhaps only he could be trusted.
Ah. Ah. That’s what should have happened.
But now it was too late. All of it.
Tears streamed down his face.
Facing death, Jegal Gil wept in despair.
Why had he only realized the truth when everything was coming to an end? Why!
“Crying? Haha! So even our great Investigator Jegal Gil is afraid of death? Kekeke!”
The man, who had been laughing for some time, finally fell silent.
“But… it’s no fun anymore. Time to finish this.”
The man slowly brought the poison to Jegal Gil’s lips.
Then,
“Stop.”
“W-who……!”
The man, about to administer the poison to Jegal Gil, spun around in shock.
In that instant,
Tap-tap-tap.
His vital points were suppressed.
He suffered the exact same fate he had inflicted on Jegal Gil.
The man who had just appeared on the scene smiled coolly.
“Me? I’m the person a bastard like you should fear most.”
Jegal Gil’s eyes widened in astonishment.
What was he doing here……?
It was impossible to believe.
It was Yeo Un-hui.

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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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