Chapter 222

His stride felt heavy.

This burden did not stem from the weight of the items he carried.

Even with the bundle strapped to his spine and the extra gear he had taken off a faltering, middle-aged recruit—bearing enough supplies for two grown men—his muscles did not complain.

The weight pressing down on him was not tethered to his limbs, but to his chest.

Thud, thud.

Perhaps the duration of a single meal had elapsed since they marched past the grand gates of the River Capital.

A rough, unpaved trail unspooled before them, flanked on both sides by towering stalks of silver grass that rippled softly in the early breeze.

Up at the vanguard of the line, billowing clouds of dust caught the morning rays, shimmering like a fine mist of gold flake.

Seok Gyeong kept his eyes fixed ahead, tracing the silhouette of the man leading them through that golden haze.

Kim Rae-won.

The esteemed Sect Leader of the Hero’s Sect.

Not once during the journey had the man cast a glance behind him.

And yet, the speed of the march was being moderated with uncanny precision.

Whenever those at the back began to flag, the vanguard slowed by a fraction; the moment the ranks closed up, the tempo increased once more.

It was as though the man possessed sight in his very shoulder blades.

Whether this was the fruit of high-tier martial arts or some instinctual awareness, Seok Gyeong possessed no knowledge to determine.

The company of dozens continued its steady traverse across the wide plains.

Among them were twenty new members.

A clear majority of these green recruits were already struggling to catch their breath.

Though a mere two hours had slipped by since their departure, two individuals were gasping on the verge of collapse, while another dragged his feet, leaning heavily on the shoulder of a companion just to stay upright.

Seok Gyeong, however, was cut from different cloth.

His lungs drew air evenly, and his stride remained unshakeable.

He had never been granted formal instruction in the ways of cultivation or combat.

His life since the tender age of twelve had consisted solely of hoisting crates, dragging heavy wagons, and breaking the earth.

But his physical form retained its own ingrained wisdom.

He knew instinctively that by shortening the length of his steps, his endurance would stretch.

He knew his chest would not tighten with heat if he drew his breaths solely through his nostrils.

He knew how to shift his entire center of gravity onto a single foot while keeping his ankle loose and fluid.

This was no secret technique of the Murim.

It was merely the calculated routine of a boy who refused to perish.

A sudden gust swept through.

The sea of silver grass bent as one, creating a dry, rustling murmur.

To Seok Gyeong, that soft friction sounded exactly like the wind weaving through the hair of his little sister, Seok Ran. …The Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion.

The moment that title drifted into his thoughts, a sharp, metallic bitterness welled up from the base of his throat.

The Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion.

It was a minor, mid-tier organization nestled along the bustling avenue known as the Western Road, situated in the western district of the River Capital.

The Western Road was a chaotic melting pot of grand and petty dojos, merchant associations, escort providers, and pleasure houses.

Every single establishment boasted a grand, lacquered placard at its entrance, though their interiors were almost universally dilapidated.

Those signs were their public countenances, and in that place, appearance was the key to survival.

The Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion operated under that exact principle.

It masqueraded openly as a standard martial arts hall.

Its grand name implied a legendary institution where vast fortunes of ten thousand gold nyang changed hands daily, but the truth was far grimmer.

Its primary income was derived from moving freight, providing hired muscles for caravans, and… overseeing an underground gambling parlor.

The designation of ‘martial hall’ was nothing more than a superficial wrapper to secure a spot within the pecking order of the Western Road.

They were ranked sixth.

Five greater entities loomed above them, while dozens of lesser operations scrambled beneath.

Yet, in the grand scheme of things, that specific hierarchy meant absolutely nothing.

Only a single entity held true relevance.

The Iron God Gang.

A colossal, terrifying syndicate that held the entire western territory of the River Capital in its iron grip.

Every single training hall and trading house along the Western Road was forced to pay regular tribute to the Iron God Gang.

When coins ran dry, they surrendered physical assets.

When assets were exhausted, they bartered with human lives.

Seok Gyeong’s sire had been nothing more than a bottom-tier brawler for the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion.

His martial prowess had never even scratched the surface of a third-rate practitioner.

Even so, he was a man of relentless industry.

He would sweep the dirt from the courtyards at first light, haul heavy crates under the midday sun, and keep watch at the entrance through the dark hours.

He functioned far more like a common servant than a recognized member of a martial house, yet his sire carried no shame regarding his station.

“My sweat puts grain in your bowl. It is up to you to earn the strength to walk your own path.”

Those were the words his sire would constantly repeat.

His mother had filled the role of a domestic maid within the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion.

Her days were spent bent over wash tubs and tending to the stoves.

She was a delicate, slender woman, though her palms were wide and calloused from labor.

The recollection of those rough palms gently smoothing down Seok Gyeong’s hair accompanied by a warm smile remained perfectly preserved in his mind.

His sire ultimately broke down and perished while moving freight.

The sheer weight of years of unceasing exhaustion had finally claimed him.

His mother did not see the end of that very same winter.

It was impossible to tell if a physical ailment had taken her, or if the spark to keep breathing had simply vanished from her spirit.

When they departed, Seok Gyeong was a boy of fourteen, and Seok Ran was a mere child of ten.

Seok Ran.

His precious little sibling, trailing him by four years.

Her name bore the elegant character for the orchid flower, Ran.

He recalled that his mother had chosen it for her.

Others would occasionally mock her, whispering that such a graceful name was ill-suited for a child born into squalor, but Seok Ran cherished it deeply.

The masters of the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion did not cast the newly orphaned children into the gutters.

Instead, they immediately put their small hands to use.

Seok Gyeong was assigned to the ranks of the pack-bearers, while Seok Ran was sent straight to the kitchens.

They had simply stepped into the exact tracks left behind by their deceased parents.

He found the strength to bear it up to that point.

No, he had no choice but to bear it.

When a heavy crate is settled on your frame, you either hold its weight or you are crushed beneath it.

A porter is never granted a middle ground.

The ruthless Jianghu was rumored to operate on those exact terms.

It was a world completely devoid of pity for young ones stripped of their protectors.

If your hands could produce value, you were permitted to draw breath; if you became dead weight, you were discarded.

Furthermore.

During that era within the River Capital, it was utterly impossible for masterless orphans to keep breathing without at least the meager protection offered by an entity like the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion.

Seok Gyeong labored with double the intensity, sweating enough to cover his sister’s quota alongside his own.

Two winters slipped away in this fashion.

The year arrived when Seok Ran reached her twelfth birthday.

The dreaded period for the syndicate’s tribute came back around.

Even after stripping their vaults of every piece of silver and clearing out their warehouses, the Pavilion fell short of the required sum.

“We have no choice but to offer flesh.”

That cold pronouncement from the mouth of the Pavilion Master fractured Seok Gyeong’s existence into irreparable halves.

A ‘flesh tribute’ that the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion could hand over to appease the Iron God Gang invariably meant a tender young maid or a youth with a spine straight enough for hard servitude.

They chose Seok Ran.

She was of tender age, already skilled in domestic duties, and most crucially, she possessed no family to seek vengeance.

Seok Gyeong threw himself at the Pavilion Master’s feet, weeping and pleading.

He smashed his brow against the wooden planks repeatedly until the skin split and crimson pooled on the floor.

The only counter he received was a flat, chilling query.

“Do you desire to throw your own corpse into the tribute pile alongside her?”

“Do not weep, big brother. They assured me it is only to help over the fires in their kitchens.”

Those were the final words Seok Ran ever spoke to him.

It was a lie, and they both knew it.

Seok Gyeong was fully aware that girls delivered into the clutches of the Iron God Gang under the guise of kitchen help were almost never permitted to look at stoves.

Yet, he possessed no power to alter the tides.

Seok Ran was bound and taken away.

She kept her gaze fixed straight ahead as they led her off.

A single moon passed before word filtered back.

She was no longer among the living.

They refused to give back her remains.

What manner of horrific end must a child meet for her killers to deny even the return of her bones?

Seok Gyeong forced his mind away from imagining it.

It was not because his mind lacked the capacity to conceive the horror, but because his soul chose absolute denial as a shield.

From that dark hour onward, a core piece inside Seok Gyeong withered to ash.

It was not a state of fury, nor was it simple grief; it was something far more hollow.

An invisible barb, forged from his own cowardice, sank deep into his center, remaining stuck where it could never be extracted.

He had stood frozen.

While his flesh and blood was being led away to slaughter.

He had done absolutely nothing.

The wind surged once more.

Seok Gyeong tilted his chin upward, staring out into the vastness.

The firmament loomed so impossibly vast it gave the illusion that it might collapse down upon the earth.

A flawless, crystalline blue canvas stretched out, void of even a stray vapor.

Beneath that endless sky, a company of roughly thirty souls pressed forward, kicking up plumes of dry earth.

The crisp fragrance of withered vegetation and parched clay commingled in the air, drifting past his face.

The seemingly permanent structure of the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion had suddenly fractured and imploded into chaos.

It took place on the exact evening that a man possessing a spine seemingly sturdier than the world itself forced the entire River Capital under a single banner.

The violent twilight that the denizens of the River Capital would forever refer to as the ‘Night of the Long Sword.’

— Do you intend to slaughter every last one of us as well?

— Have your hands committed atrocities foul enough to merit a death sentence?

— N-no. I… I have never done anything that demands my execution.

— Then from where does your terror stem? I do not reap the lives of those whose existence carries utility.

It was highly probable that the brief exchange that legendary figure shared with a representative of the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion on that fateful night was the very reason his feet were currently treading this road.

Following that world-altering event, he simply let the days bleed into one another, waiting for the right moment to walk away from the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion.

He had packed his meager belongings after laying eyes on the public boards announcing the recruitment trials for the Hero’s Sect.

He had offered no farewells to the overseers of the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion.

Who could possibly waste a thought on the sudden absence of a solitary pack-handler?

The establishment had already degenerated into a pathetic collection of ghosts, merely lingering in existence because they lacked the resolve to end it.

He questioned whether he was any different from them, though he could at least take solace in the fact that his physical form remained unbroken.

The reason he had lingered so long was not due to any lingering attachment to that place.

It was simply that he had entirely forgotten how to take an independent step forward.

Truthfully, when he entered those grounds, he had harbored zero expectations of actually being granted entry into the Hero’s Sect.

The vivid recollections of that trial naturally bubbled up in his mind.

He had been assigned the number two hundred and fifteen, sitting at the absolute tail end of the gathering.

He had waited for hours on end.

Hundreds of applicants had stepped forward before his turn came, and the vast majority of them had shuffled out of the courtyard with shattered pride and lowered heads.

By the time Seok Gyeong was summoned to step onto the floor, the final rays of the sun had already slipped below the horizon.

Only Sect Leader Kim Rae-won sat waiting before him.

The man’s countenance was entirely blank.

It did not radiate malice or frigidity; rather, it resembled an absolute void.

A pair of eyes completely stripped of standard human sentiment.

They resembled a profound, ancient well filled to the brim with dark water—immensely deep, yet reflecting absolutely nothing of the world on its surface.

Yet, the precise moment those vacant eyes locked onto his form, an unnamable, crushing pressure descended upon his entire being.

It did not constrict his airways, but it caused his spine to snap perfectly straight by some internal reflex.

“Define righteousness.”

The instant that inquiry struck his ears, a sudden wave of… self-ridicule washed over him.

What business did a common freight-hauler, who could not even claim lineage from a recognized third-rate swordsman, have standing in a place of such gravitas?

And so, he fell into a long, agonizing silence.

When he finally parted his lips, the solitary response his mind could assemble was…

“I possess no understanding of what true righteousness constitutes.”

Seok Gyeong dropped his gaze toward the stones.

“And yet.”

He ground his teeth together until they clicked.

“And yet, I am acutely aware that remaining frozen and doing absolutely nothing while my flesh and blood was dragged off to the dens of the Iron God Gang was the absolute antithesis of righteousness.”

A heavy, suffocating quiet descended over the courtyard.

But it did not endure for long.

“That sister of yours, where is she now?”

“Perished.”

Another brief, heavy pause followed.

“State your moniker.”

“I am called Seok Gyeong.”

“No, I require the name of your sibling.”

Seok Gyeong, blinking away a flash of confusion, raised his eyes to look squarely into Kim Rae-won’s face.

However, those eyes remained an impenetrable, bottomless chasm, revealing no hint of the thoughts churning beneath.

“She was… Seok Ran.”

A slight tremor betrayed his voice as the syllables left his lips.

The Sect Leader offered a solitary, measured nod after a beat of silence.

“Her name will be kept in my memory.”

That comprised the entirety of their exchange.

Yet, that single declaration transformed something fundamental within him.

An unidentifiable ripple began to expand outward through the frozen chambers of Seok Gyeong’s heart.

What grand purpose it served, or what manner of seed it was planting in his soul, Seok Gyeong lacked the wisdom to articulate.

He knew only one absolute truth.

That specific name—belonging to a little girl whose broken body had never been retrieved, who possessed no marker or resting place in the earth, a name that the cowards at the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion chose to bury in absolute silence.

This man had sworn to remember it.

The very man who had reduced the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion—the den of cowards that had traded Seok Ran away—into a hollowed-out shell.

The very man who had systematically ground the Iron God Gang—the monsters that had consumed Seok Ran—into absolute nonexistence.

It was an undeniable reality that this individual had shattered a massive, stone-like barrier that had remained locked shut within his mind for five long years.

Just as the sun reached its absolute apex in the sky, the Sect Leader called a halt for the very first time.

“Halt and recuperate.”

At that solitary command, the entire procession dropped to the earth in perfect synchronization.

Positioned at the absolute tail end of the marching column were two figures who appeared completely unaffected by the grueling journey.

A woman bearing a pristine blade strapped across her shoulder blades, alongside a man gently holding an elegant fan.

The whispers among the recruits labeled them as Trigram Masters hailing from the renowned Formation Tower.

Given their titles as experts in the arcane arts of Formations, it was difficult for a commoner to precisely grasp the nature of their arts, but they were unquestionably elite combatants who had scaled heights completely beyond the comprehension of an uneducated laborer like himself.

The woman chose to rest against the trunk of a nearby tree, her stoic countenance never shifting as she stared into the distance, while her male counterpart rhythmically swept his fan back and forth, his sharp gaze methodically evaluating every recruit in the line.

Despite having maintained a punishing, near-sprinting velocity for half the day, not a solitary speck of grime or trail dust had managed to adhere to the fabric of his robes.

For what reason figures of such immense caliber would choose to reside within a frontier outpost like the River Capital, much less serve within the ranks of the infant Hero’s Sect, was a riddle Seok Gyeong could not begin to untangle.

However, that stark reality alone provided him with enough context to deduce that the supreme leader of the Hero’s Sect was a figure cut from an extraordinary cloth.

Seok Gyeong settled his frame onto the dry grass, tilting his canteen to swallow water while keeping his eyes trained on the Sect Leader at the front of the line.

Right at that moment, a sudden flurry of movement erupted near the vanguard.

One of the younger recruits had completely lost consciousness, collapsing into the dirt.

Before Seok Gyeong could even plant his feet to assist, the youth recognized by all as the Instructor was already darting across the ground.

He deftly seized the limp arm of the fallen member, hoisting him back to his feet with practiced ease while pressing a container of water into his palms.

He murmured a few quiet words.

The distance was too great for the syllables to carry, but the collapsed youth offered a weak nod and immediately forced his legs to resume their forward motion.

The entire incident was resolved in a flash.

The crisis had been managed and put to rest before Seok Gyeong could even take a single step forward.

The company simply referred to him as the Instructor.

He was a youth who appeared to be fourteen or perhaps fifteen winters old at the absolute maximum.

When Seok Gyeong had initially heard the title, he had dismissed it as an exaggeration.

The Murim was traditionally an environment where rank was dictated by martial prowess rather than standard age, but rumor dictated that the Hero’s Sect was an entirely unique, newly forged institution.

He had heard tales that when Sect Leader Kim Rae-won moved to dismantle the Iron God Gang, he had accomplished the feat entirely by his own hand and laid the foundations of this sect in absolute isolation.

This implied that the young Instructor must have entered the fold sometime after that bloody purge, meaning his internal reserves and combat experience should naturally be shallow… And yet.

Observing the boy’s conduct now, he was forced to silently acknowledge that his initial assumptions had been completely flawed.

That youth was invariably the very first to detect the exact moment any individual’s pace began to falter.

The deliberate arrangement of the children into distinct vanguard and rearguard detachments—where the front tier harmonized with the Sect Leader’s blinding speed while the rear tier acted as a safety net to catch those who stumbled—had been meticulously mapped out before a single boot had touched the trail.

This was not the simple, linear observation of a cargo-bearer.

This was the macro-perspective belonging to a seasoned military commander.

The period of recuperation lasted for less time than it took to consume a simple bowl of grain.

The youth known as the Instructor personally made the rounds through the resting ranks, bending down to inspect the condition of each individual’s ankles and muscles.

Following his inspection, he trotted over to a woman possessing a remarkably slender, athletic frame and delivered a concise report in hushed tones.

This was the woman who remained glued to the right hand of the Sect Leader.

She was the custodian tasked with carrying the official sect ledger.

The woman offered a brief nod of assent, murmuring a quick succession of orders back to the Instructor, who promptly sprinted back to the line to re-order the positions of the young recruits.

He deftly shifted two struggling youths from the vanguard down into the rearguard, while simultaneously pulling a child possessing superior lung capacity from the back up to reinforce the front line.

Seok Gyeong simply drank from his vessel, absorbing the entire sequence of events.

That woman clearly functioned as the primary lieutenant to the Sect Leader.

Yet, she was far more than a simple servant executing commands.

Watching her authoritatively issue dictates to the Instructor made it obvious that the actual logistical machinery of the sect rested squarely upon her shoulders.

The Sect Leader mapped out the grand trajectory, the woman organized the minute details.

Meanwhile, the Instructor actively managed the physical field of operations.

These three individuals were anchoring the entire weight of this column through a beautifully synchronized, multi-layered system.

It was an organizational blueprint he had never once witnessed within the walls of the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion.

The Master of the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion operated solely by barking absolute commands.

The high-level logistics were managed by the Master alone, and the day-to-day field operations were similarly micro-managed by the Master.

The remaining members functioned merely as mindless tools, shifting only when explicit prodding was applied.

For that exact reason, the precise moment the Pavilion Master suffered his physical collapse, the entire institution instantly degenerated into chaos.

Because there was no secondary structure designed to distribute the burden, a single individual shouldered the entire mass, and when that solitary pillar buckled, the entire freight spilled violently into the mud.

The reality here was entirely different.

The distinction extended far beyond the efficiency of their organizational habits; despite the absolute certainty that they had only entered the gates after the Hero’s Sect was officially consecrated… they actively ‘possessed’ legitimate, high-tier martial arts.

That administrative woman and those young handlers were genuinely formidable.

An uneducated practitioner of his low station could not begin to calculate the exact depth of their internal reservoirs, but the unmistakable aura and smooth posture characteristic of true martial experts radiated from them clearly.

He harbored deep doubts as to whether such staggering transformation could genuinely be achieved within such a compressed window of time.

During his entire tenure at the Ten Thousand Gold Pavilion, not a single senior member had ever bothered to properly demonstrate a form or correct his posture.

“Resume the march.”

The Sect Leader shifted to his feet.

A three-word decree.

That comprised the entirety of his command.

At the sound of that solitary utterance, every single body across the grass was seen rising in absolute unison.

Even the recruits who had been on the absolute brink of unconsciousness clenched their jaws, forcing their trembling limbs to lock into place.

Not a single voice rose to whine, ‘Grant us a few moments more to breathe.’

It was a deeply surreal sight.

Seok Gyeong mirrored their movements, hoisting the heavy travel gear back onto his spine.

A double portion intended for two grown men.

The rhythmic sound of footsteps resumed along the dirt road.

And within his chest.

Something had fundamentally shifted.