The Legend of Red Cloud - Chapter 78

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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 78. Setting Fire to Straw
His grandfather, who had told him never to return until the matter was settled, stood before him now.
“Grandfather.”
“This is official business.”
Four elders stood behind his grandfather.
Since the Hwangbo Clan had seven elders in total, this meant more than half had been mobilized.
Hwangbo Jang Seong smiled, thinking it fortunate that his grandfather’s vigor remained undiminished.
“Yes, I understand, Patriarch.”
To Hwangbo Jang Seong, who bowed respectfully again, Hwangbo Ji Ung—the Hwangbo Clan Patriarch and one of the Fifteen Great Martial Lords, known as the Overlord Fist King—spoke.
“You have been blessed with fortune.”
“The fortune Your Excellency speaks of must be the Fortune of Human Relationships, surely?”
“Yes. One of the most important things in a person’s life is precisely that fortune. And knowing how to use it properly is equally vital.”
Hwangbo Jang Seong knew all too well what would come next.
And indeed it did.
“When will you bring him to me?”
“He will not move, sir.”
At Hwangbo Jang Seong’s response, the Hwangbo Clan Patriarch’s eyes hardened as he asked.
“How old are you that you address him as your senior?”
Hwangbo Jang Seong was thirty-five; the known age of Jeok Sa was thirty-two.
Hwangbo Jang Seong was the elder by age.
To his grandfather, who asked with displeasure at how he had acquired such detailed information, Hwangbo Jang Seong answered with a rueful smile.
“It is the code of the Jeok Sa Jo. Juniors are to regard seniors as heaven itself.”
“A pointless rule.”
But beyond that, he said nothing more.
The Hwangbo Clan Patriarch understood as well as anyone that every organization had its own rules.
Especially since he himself was currently maintaining the distinction between public and private even in this encounter between grandfather and grandson.
So, setting that aside, he returned to the main point.
“You mean this man Jeok Sa will not move?”
“Yes.”
“Then your sincerity must be lacking.”
With those words, the Patriarch rose from his seat without hesitation, muttering.
“If your sincerity falls short, I shall make up the difference.”
Knowing precisely what that meant, Hwangbo Jang Seong moved to stop him.
“Patriarch.”
“What? Do you have more to say?”
“Could you not trust me and wait a little longer?”
“Wait for what?”
“Bonds are not only forged when held in hand. They are also bonds when held in the heart.”
“Does holding something in the heart truly help? When I bleed, will that bond held in the heart extend its hand to me? That is what I ask.”
The Patriarch, having stared at Hwangbo Jang Seong for a moment as he struggled to answer, turned his body.
“It is not right to speak of the Clan’s future with uncertainty.”
As the Patriarch moved away, Hwangbo Jang Seong watched him with wavering eyes—then his gaze hardened.
“I am certain!”
“What?”
The Patriarch, having turned his head from where he had gone some distance, asked, and Hwangbo Jang Seong answered loudly.
“I am confident, sir.”
He was speaking of his certainty that the bond held in his heart would extend its hand when the Hwangbo Clan faced crisis.
The Patriarch, who had been watching Hwangbo Jang Seong intently, turned his body.
Whether he had accepted his request or not, Hwangbo Jang Seong could not know.
And he could not press further.
For the nature of springing back when pushed was not his alone.
It was the nature of the entire Hwangbo Clan.
So it was better not to pressure him further.
Thus Hwangbo Jang Seong could only watch as the Patriarch moved away.
***
“You said this was my last chance!”
To Peng Jing, who spoke in a deeply depressed tone, the Peng Clan Patriarch answered.
“Chances are things that change.”
At his father’s answer, Peng Jing asked with a face grown rigid.
“Then what am I to do, Father?”
“Wouldn’t it be rather fortunate for the Peng Clan if we added another master of the Flame Realm to our ranks?”
“I’ve never heard any mention of Father having a daughter, sir.”
“Are only my own children daughters of the Peng Clan?”
“You mean to adopt a foster daughter, Father?”
“If it serves the purpose, what is there we cannot do?”
Peng Jing’s expression darkened at his father’s reply.
“Does Grandfather know of this as well?”
“It was your grandfather’s counsel. His words were clear: by whatever means necessary, do not let her slip away.”
No one coveted talent more fiercely than his grandfather.
If a person possessed skill and belonged to no faction, he gathered them all.
Indeed, the rumor in Kangho held that the only reason the Fierce Tiger Bandit Army served as a secondary branch leader of the Cheol Hyeol Maeng was to draw even more outside talent through that position.
As a result, the current Peng Clan harbored more masters who bore names other than Peng than those who did.
Of course, Peng Jing himself acknowledged that the Peng Clan’s martial strength had grown thicker because of it.
Yet he could not in good conscience swear that they would shed blood and fight for the Peng Clan in its hour of crisis.
From what Peng Jing knew, a considerable number of those gathered in this manner cared only for the money the Peng Clan provided and the pleasures that came with it.
His father was not a man to overlook such things.
“Why do you permit it, sir?”
Though his question cut to the heart of the matter, the Peng Clan Patriarch understood perfectly.
“Because your grandfather’s course of action is sound.”
“You mean to say that even if they are men who covet nothing but money and fall victim to the charms of the women we provide, numbers alone suffice?”
“Yes.”
“How so, Father?”
The Peng Clan Patriarch answered his son’s provocative question.
“There was a time when challenges to the Peng Clan came without number. Many sought a place among the Nine Major Sects, yet there were only nine such positions.”
The Peng Clan Patriarch, Peng Jing’s own father, continued speaking as his son fell silent, unsure of his meaning.
“Yet here is the curious thing—even men who cared only for coin and carnal pleasure, once their numbers swelled our martial strength, fewer dared challenge us. Have you ever heard tell of the Peng Clan being challenged since you were born?”
“No… I have not, sir.”
“Exactly. I grew up watching our Peng Clan’s warriors return bloodied almost daily. I saw some perish in duels. I saw their families weep in sorrow. They were my cousins, my blood. Your grandfather put an end to that.”
When Peng Jing said nothing, unaware such things had occurred, the Peng Clan Patriarch spoke to him.
“Right and wrong? Such things matter little. My blood does not die. My family does not grieve. Your grandfather and I—that sufficed for us. Let the world point its fingers; for me, that is enough.”
“Then you wish to make her a formal member of the clan, Father?”
“The world changes. The Baek Ui Ryeon has begun to take an interest, and various sects of the Cheol Hyeol Maeng are sounding out individual alliances with them. A time of force may come sooner than we think.”
It was to say that the Cheol Hyeol Maeng and the Baek Ui Ryeon might become one.
Certainly, talk of merger between the two had surfaced before.
They wielded such influence over one another that it was inevitable.
“You mean to enlarge the clan through merger?”
“If we are only to divide the spoils as before, there is no reason to merge at all.”
From his father’s answer, Peng Jing suddenly grasped that even if the Baek Ui Ryeon merged, the number of Nine Major Sects at the heart of the Cheol Hyeol Maeng would remain unchanged.
One sect from the Baek Ui Ryeon would become one of the Nine.
Necessarily, one of the existing Nine Major Sects would be cast out.
Blood would spill.
Blood on a scale to rival the war with the Gunma Rim.
Feeling the Peng Clan’s will to survive in that bloodshed, Peng Jing could not find it in himself to simply tell his father to let the matter rest.
“I will make arrangements, Father.”
A smile touched the corner of the Peng Clan Patriarch’s mouth at his son’s answer.
“It will be good for you as well. After all, the one who cultivates ties with her will become the Peng Clan’s foremost master—a straight path to the Vice Clan Patriarch’s seat, would you not say?”
His father’s words merely echoed in his ears without touching his heart.
Perhaps it was because the thought had seized Peng Jing’s mind that he might lose a connection he had finally come to treasure.
***
Cheol Ja Ryong could not hide the surprise in his eyes at a situation so different from that of the previous two men.
“Cheol Ja Gyeong!”
“Oh! Brother!”
The woman greeting him warmly was like a radiant peony.
If Mo Yong Ji Eun had been unadorned as a hydrangea, and the I Hwa he’d met at the Saja Hall pristine as a daffodil,
then the woman now before Cheol Ja Ryong’s eyes was like a rose.
Vivid and brilliant.
In beauty alone, she seemed to surpass the two women before her.
So much so that the weathered, drab inn seemed utterly transformed into brilliance by her presence alone.
A beauty that captivates kingdoms.
She was precisely the sort of woman the old saying described—one whose beauty might topple an empire.
She was likely one of the Three Beauties of the White Robe Alliance.
Cheol Ja Gyeong, the Iron Flower.
She was Cheol Ja Ryong’s one and only sister.
“What are you doing here…?”
He asked, understanding at once.
The Soju Steel Workshop had decided to send his sister Cheol Ja Gyeong to Ryu.
He was startled by this.
But what surprised Cheol Ja Ryong even more was that he felt no displeasure at it.
Far from it—the thought of Ryu as his sister’s companion didn’t strike him as a bad thing at all.
He knew well now that beneath Ryu’s cold, taciturn exterior lay a man who cared fiercely for his people.
The moment this realization struck him, Cheol Ja Ryong made his decision.
“Come with me. There’s someone I want to introduce you to.”
He seized her hand and pulled her out, and Cheol Ja Gyeong stared after him in astonishment.
She had expected her brother to rage like a wildfire.
Their father’s reasons for treasuring her and Cheol Ja Ryong’s reasons were utterly different.
Their father fussed over her while searching for a better match that might benefit the Soju Steel Workshop, whereas Cheol Ja Ryong cherished her for who she was.
That was why she had planned to escape with his help.
She had no desire to be bartered away in marriage to a man who spent his days bloodied on the front lines.
But confronted by her brother seizing her hand and rushing forward, she could only stare in confusion.
As Cheol Ja Ryong ran, dragging his sister by the hand, the Soju Steel Workshop warriors escorting her had no choice but to dash after them.
Suddenly, dozens of martial artists flooded the streets of Mu Chang in a frenzied throng.
Cheol Ja Ryong hadn’t anticipated it, but Mu Chang had become a powder keg.
To recruit Jeok Sa, not only the Nine Major Sects but every lesser sect worth its name had converged on the city.
When a large group of warriors suddenly came running through their midst—
It started with the Hwangha Suli Maeng.
Already in foul spirits from their first failed attempt, they collided with the rushing warriors in the street.
“You bastard!”
If the previous collision had been intentional, this one was genuine.
And their anger was very real.
Rather than an apology, their quarry drew an axe.
“What! Bastard? You got a death wish?”
The Soju Steel Workshop began as a smithy—a forge, in other words.
All day wrestling with fire and flame, their founders had trained in martial arts, and thus the Soju Steel Workshop took its present form.
Because of that history, the warriors of the Soju Steel Workshop were still blacksmiths, still working steel.
Perhaps because they handled fire so intimately, the warriors of the Soju Steel Workshop burned with the same volatile temperament as the Peng Clan or the Hwangbo Clan.
If the Soju Steel Workshop burned hot, the Hwangha Suli Maeng was temper incarnate.
Men born to gall alone, drawing swords and sailing from ship to ship, living for nothing but a fight.
“What! Death wish? Come on then, you bastard!”
When fire met fire, the outcome was inevitable.
“A brawl!”
Someone’s shout rang out as bodies collided.
What began as a skirmish between the Hwangha Suli Maeng and the Soju Steel Workshop warriors soon spread, drawing in bystanders who happened to be passing through.
The sharp tempers of those who lived by the blade ignited like kindling at the touch of flame, blazing up in an instant.
The chaos reached all the way to the Inn where the Jeok Sa Jo was staying.
Crash!
A window shattered with a deafening din, and brawling figures tumbled inside, grappling and trading blows.
While the Jeok Sa Jo members on the first floor watched in bewilderment, Cheol Ja Ryong came dashing through, drenched in blood, gripping a woman’s hand.
Dong Pil stared at him in alarm.
“Ja Ryong! What’s with all that blood?”
At Dong Pil’s startled cry, a deafening crack split the air as the inn ceiling collapsed and Ryu dropped through.
The two words—Ja Ryong and blood—had sent him crashing down from above.

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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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