The Great Heavenly Sword Emperor - Chapter 5

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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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#005. The Gwi Wang Jeon (3)

The Blackspot Society.
A name for those who made wickedness their trade.
The Blackspot Society took many forms—some operated alone, while others worked in groups.
As Cheon Mu-gyeol had come seeking them, they connected assassins with bounty contractors, but they engaged in far darker enterprises as well.
Human trafficking, black-market dealings, fraud—they committed every depravity a person could conceive of.
Consequently, those who belonged to the Blackspot Society were invariably strong, fearless, and brutal by nature.
Yet for all their sharp instincts, the men who encountered Cheon Mu-gyeol made one fatal mistake: drink.
Their senses were keen enough in the ordinary way, but alcohol had proven their undoing—stupefied by it, they had failed to recognize Cheon Mu-gyeol’s true caliber, or at least to grasp that he was a man beyond their reckoning.
“Agh!”
The three members of the Blackspot Society lay groaning on the floor, their bodies twisted in pain.
Cheon Mu-gyeol had not even drawn the Cheon Shin Sword this time.
With a single unarmed hand, he had felled all three with contemptuous ease, and now he stood watching them with cool detachment.
“Stand up.”
The Blackspot Society members obeyed Cheon Mu-gyeol’s command without resistance.
They forced their broken bodies upright, legs trembling beneath them as they fought to remain standing.
Cheon Mu-gyeol studied each of them in turn before stating his purpose.
“I’ve heard that one can find assassins by seeking out the Blackspot Society.”
At his words, the three members tensed visibly, swallowing hard.
“Y-you mean you wish to hire an assassin? To place a contract?”
Even as he spoke, he knew the question was foolish.
Whatever this man’s true strength might be, anyone capable of subduing three opponents with a single hand was formidably skilled.
What would such a person need with hiring an assassin?
When Cheon Mu-gyeol shook his head, the three felt fear mixed with curiosity.
“I need to meet them. I have questions.”
“You… you do understand what assassins are, don’t you?”
One of the Blackspot Society members ventured the question cautiously.
Assassins never spoke, under any circumstances.
Especially not to outsiders—those who were not assassins themselves.
Some assassin organizations even trained their killers with severed tongues from the start.
Yet this man wished to speak with an assassin.
He seemed to possess not the faintest knowledge of what such beings were.
“All you need tell me is whether you can arrange such a meeting or not. That is the only question. Everything else is irrelevant.”
Cheon Mu-gyeol’s cold voice sent fresh waves of dread through the three.
“The truth is, we do place contracts with assassins, but we never meet them directly to do so. We know the method, that’s all—we have no direct contact with the assassins themselves.”
At this answer, Cheon Mu-gyeol fell silent for a moment, thinking, then fixed his gaze upon all three.
His eyes were so profound and piercing that their bodies trembled involuntarily.
If a glance alone could kill, surely it would be eyes like these—eyes so cold and terrible they seemed to brush against death itself.
They tried to look away, but found themselves bound as surely as if roped, unable to escape that stare.
“We’re telling the truth! We only leave the contract details and the advance payment at a designated location—we’ve never met them! This is real!”
The Blackspot member who had been speaking shook like an aspen leaf, his voice desperate and urgent.
The other two beside him nodded rapidly in confirmation, as if to vouch for every word.
“Then there is no way to meet an assassin?”
“Well, there is one way, but…”
The member trailed off, gauging his response carefully.
“Speak.”
“T-there is only one way to meet an assassin directly. Become the target of a contract.”
“Become the target.”
“Y-yes. But that’s as good as signing your own death warrant, so in practical terms, there is no way to meet them…”
“Very well.”
Cheon Mu-gyeol cut off the member’s words.
If becoming a contract target was the only means to meet an assassin, then so be it.
Cheon Mu-gyeol harbored no hesitation.
“W-what?!”
The Blackspot member’s eyes widened in shock.
Once you become the target of a bounty, death is certain.
Assassins possess a dogged nature, and their defining trait is the determination to see their contract through by any means.
That’s how they earn recognition, how they land the next job.
That’s how they build trust—their way of doing business.
Which is precisely why it’s said to be virtually impossible to meet an assassin directly, yet he’d accepted the proposition without hesitation.
Was he sane, or genuinely insane?
His expression seemed sincere enough—nothing mad about him—yet he walked straight toward certain death without flinching.
No, he’s definitely mad.
The whole idea of seeking out assassins had started from madness: tracking down the Blackspot Society specifically to meet one. Only a lunatic could conceive and act on such thoughts.
The Blackspot Society reached this conclusion even as confusion turned their mind white as bone.
“What must I do to place a bounty?”
Cheon Mu-gyeol’s question jolted the Blackspot Society member back to awareness, and he stammered out a reply through his bewilderment.
“Ah? Y-yes. Well… it helps to have detailed information about the target, and we’d need to agree on the bounty payment amount…”
“The payment.”
Cheon Mu-gyeol withdrew the Gwi Wang Jeon from his breast.
The Blackspot Society members recognized it immediately, of course.
“This—where did you obtain this?”
His voice trembled.
The Gwi Wang Jeon of the now-vanished Guigok should not exist in this man’s possession.
What connection did this man have to Guigok? And why would someone who possessed the Gwi Wang Jeon seek out an assassin?
No—trying to fathom the logic of a madman was absurdity itself.
“I came by it by chance, nothing more. Is one alone insufficient as a bounty payment?”
At Cheon Mu-gyeol’s question, the Blackspot Society member shook his head.
In terms of monetary value alone, it was criminally insufficient.
A contract to kill someone could command whatever price the contractor named—quite dear, indeed.
But if the payment offered was the Gwi Wang Jeon, the matter changed entirely.
Among assassins, the Gwi Wang Jeon had once carried considerable weight as an artifact.
The question was whether any assassin would actually accept a contract upon seeing it.
“Hm… Well, let me confirm the details. Forgive me, but your name…?”
“I won’t be disclosing my name. But I can tell you where I’m staying.”
Cheon Mu-gyeol gave the location of his lodging.
The Blackspot Society member summarized what he’d heard.
“So, to be clear: the target is a foreign guest staying in the second room from the end of the third floor of the Hyeon-yong Inn within Sicheon, and the bounty payment is one Gwi Wang Jeon. Shall we proceed on these terms?”
Cheon Mu-gyeol nodded.
“Understood. I’ll submit the contract immediately.”
The situation remained too surreal to process easily; the Blackspot Society members seemed unable to shake their bewilderment.
“You seem to know about the Gwi Wang Jeon. Let me ask you something else.”
“Yes? Ah, yes.”
“I’ve heard that Gwi Wang Jeon belonged to Guigok. Do you know why Guigok disappeared?”
At Cheon Mu-gyeol’s question, all three members of the Blackspot Society shook their heads.
“We merely broker between contractors and assassins. Their world is not our concern. All we know is that one day, Guigok vanished like a ghost.”
As expected, the Blackspot Society knew nothing more.
Had they possessed more detailed knowledge, Bohyeon Temple could hardly remain ignorant.
“I see. The sooner the contract is executed, the better.”
With that, Cheon Mu-gyeol departed as calmly as if nothing had transpired.
“Aah!”
The Blackspot Society members collapsed to the ground in unison as tension drained from them.
What had just occurred remained a swirl of confusion in their minds.
Yet there was no time to languish in that confusion.
Before the madman returned, they had to submit this absurd contract as quickly as possible.
The Blackspot Society members sprang into action.

* * *

Late into the night, at the inn.
Cheon Mu-gyeol lay in bed with utmost serenity, seeking sleep.
He slumbered with a tranquility that seemed impossible for someone who’d just placed a contract on his own life.
The room fell silent, undisturbed by any sound save the rhythm of his breathing.
It was precisely when the faint light filtering through the window began to dissolve into darkness.
Through the cracks of the tightly sealed door, wisps of unknown smoke crept slowly upward.
Smoke tinged with a mild scent seeped silently into the room and drifted toward the sleeping figure on the bed—toward Cheon Mu-gyeol.
With each breath Cheon Mu-gyeol drew, the smoke was pulled deeper into his lungs.
Whisper.
The door opened without a sound, and a shadow slipped inside.
An Assassin, sent on a Bounty—one that Cheon Mu-gyeol himself had commissioned, asking to be killed.
Moving without a whisper, the Assassin glided toward the bed.
Whoosh!
The moment the Assassin reached the bedside, he moved like lightning, drawing his blade and driving it down in a single fluid stroke.
A perfect strike, flawless in its aim—the heart of Cheon Mu-gyeol dead center in his sights.
“!”
In that instant, the Assassin’s eyes—visible above the face cloth—flew wide open.
The Short Dagger should have shattered ribs and buried itself deep in the heart.
Yet it could not pierce Cheon Mu-gyeol’s skin. It stopped cold.
Clang!
The blade rebounded as though struck by an invisible force.
A sharp intake of breath—then a grasp!
In the same moment, Cheon Mu-gyeol’s eyes snapped open, and a hand faster than sight shot out to seize the Assassin’s throat.
Whirl!
Cheon Mu-gyeol rose like a tiger, caught the Assassin’s recoiling arm, and with tremendous force, twisted him around.
Their positions reversed.
Astride the pinned Assassin, Cheon Mu-gyeol clamped his hand over the man’s cheek, sealing his mouth shut, then bent the arm he was holding until—
Crack!
“!”
Agony should have torn through him, yet the Assassin released not even the briefest whimper.
Cheon Mu-gyeol bore down, keeping the Assassin immobilized beneath him, then spoke.
“I am the Bounty Contractor. This Bounty came from me—a request for my own death—so there is no such thing as failure here. My purpose is to meet an Assassin. Answer a few of my questions without resistance, and you will live.”
Cheon Mu-gyeol looked down at the Assassin as he spoke.
But the Assassin offered no reply, only a glare of defiance.
Then it happened.
Crack!
The Assassin did something mad.
He broke his own already-shattered arm further.
Twisting his trapped body, he created a gap and tried to wriggle free from beneath Cheon Mu-gyeol.
Scrape!
But Cheon Mu-gyeol would not simply release him.
He let go of the twisted arm and instead seized the Assassin’s exposed ribs in a brutal grip as the man tried to slip away.
Crunch!
A sickening sound rang out, as though flesh and muscle were being torn open.
Even now the Assassin made no sound, yet his body thrashed against the unbearable pain.
“I have no wish to kill you or cause greater injury. You received the Bounty Payment as a Gwi Wang Jeon, did you not? Guigok. I want to know about them.”
Cheon Mu-gyeol posed his questions with cold, merciless precision as the Assassin struggled beneath him.
Whether the man could not speak or would not speak was unclear, but the Assassin remained silent.
Cold sweat drenched the Assassin’s face cloth, soaked through by the agony he endured.
Then it came.
Crash!
The window shattered, and two more Assassins burst through.
Whoosh!
One of them lunged forward toward Cheon Mu-gyeol with a swift attack.
But Cheon Mu-gyeol did not flinch. Still gripping the ribs of the subdued Assassin beneath him, he swept his other hand outward.
Crack!
Unable to withstand the force unleashed from Cheon Mu-gyeol’s hand, the attacking Assassin was driven backward through the broken window and hurled outside.
Whoosh!
In that same instant, the companion Assassin drove a Short Dagger down precisely toward Cheon Mu-gyeol’s crown.
Hiss!
Cheon Mu-gyeol wrapped the restrained Assassin close, twisted away from the bed, and slipped free of the danger.
He held the pinned Assassin cradled before him like a shield, facing the one who had just tried to strike.
“I wish only to speak. I ask that you cease your attack.”
Though he knew words would likely fall on deaf ears, Cheon Mu-gyeol persisted in his attempt at reason.
And as expected, the effort was in vain.
Crash!
The wall behind Cheon Mu-gyeol shattered, and several sharp blades shot forth.
Cheon Mu-gyeol moved swiftly, clutching the assassin to his chest to evade the assault.
In that instant, the assassin in front closed the distance rapidly and reached toward him.
Caught between attacks from both sides, even Cheon Mu-gyeol could not escape easily.
It would have been manageable unarmed, but holding the assassin like a hostage made it far worse.
In the end, Cheon Mu-gyeol had no choice but to release his captive.
The assassin in front steadied his stumbling comrade, while the others who had been lying in wait behind Cheon Mu-gyeol rushed into the room and stood ready to cover them.
A standoff ensued between Cheon Mu-gyeol and the assassins.
Then, in a single moment.
Whoosh!
The assassins withdrew en masse through the shattered window and the damaged wall.
Cheon Mu-gyeol gazed silently at the wall through which they had vanished.
“W-what on earth is the meaning of this!”
The innkeeper, startled awake by the commotion in the dead of night, stepped cautiously into the ruined room and demanded an explanation.
Her face was etched with shock.
Cheon Mu-gyeol glanced back at the innkeeper and spoke.
“I apologize.”
Bang!
With those words, Cheon Mu-gyeol hurled himself out of the inn.
He had no intention of letting the assassins slip away now that he had finally found them.
“Ah!”
The innkeeper stood bewildered, staring at the shattered window and walls.
“Damn it! What kind of insanity is this!”
The innkeeper’s cry of anguish echoed into the night.

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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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