Chapter 1222: Scorched World

Screams without a sound. Namgung Jin just collapsed to his knees and buried his head into the ground.

“Gguk… Ggeueueueue!”

It must hurt quite a bit, as he couldn’t even make a proper sound. His trembling body was quite impressive.

While I was staring intently at that guy.

“Young Master Baek…!”

Mi Hyoran runs over this way, surprised.

“What… What are you doing right now!”

Mi Hyoran spoke while looking at the fallen Namgung Jin. Seeing that, I nonchalantly brushed my hands off.

“Can’t you tell if you look?”

What an obvious question to ask.

“I’m stepping on him.”

“…No…!”

I’m in the middle of stepping on Namgung Jin. It’s a simple and optimal answer, but.

“How can you say that…! What are you trying to do! Why did you come out?”

Mi Hyoran says, seemingly unconvinced.

“If you had just stayed inside, it would have been resolved…! Why are you creating a misunderstanding?”

“A misunderstanding?”

I let out a small chuckle. As I laughed, Mi Hyoran faltered.

“Ah. How annoying.”

Unfiltered words flowed out of my mouth.

Mi Hyoran flinched slightly at the voice.

I ran my hand through my hair. Annoyance surged. It was annoyance directed not at Mi Hyoran, but at Namgung Jin.

“Hey.”

Tuk.

I poked him with the tip of my foot.

“Ggeueu…”

Clutching his left arm and groaning, he seemed just like someone else.

Ah, right. This guy’s son also ended up in this state with me.

“Stop whining. I deliberately broke your left arm out of consideration for you.”

Since I knew he used his sword with his right hand, I kindly smashed his left arm for him.

I don’t know why this guy whines so much.

“This guy…!”

Taking the chance, perhaps still possessing some grit, he started glaring at me, grinding his teeth.

“It’s you again… You…! What did you do with Miss Mi…! What did you do…!”

“What did I do, you crazy bastard? I didn’t do anything.”

What disgusting words are those.

“Didn’t do anything…? If you didn’t do anything, why are you coming out from that place?”

“Well, there were circumstances. What business is it of yours anyway?”

“…As expected, it’s you…”

Ggeueuk.

The guy groans and gets up. It must hurt considerably, but he was enduring it well.

“It’s you again. You covet my women. Gu Cheol-un. You’re more of a problem than that guy.”

“…Ah, what disgusting talk.”

Even amidst all that, his words were grating.

“Who are ‘your women’? Both of them weren’t women from your side, were they?”

Let’s grant that Hyeon So-yeong might be, but Mi Hyoran isn’t.

Look, isn’t Mi Hyoran looking at Namgung Jin with utter contempt right now?

“Well, it might be something that could cause a misunderstanding, but that’s not the case, so stop talking bullshit.”

Since I came out of Mi Hyoran’s room, one could misunderstand.

I understand. I would have thought the same if it were me, and this wasn’t the reason I hit him.

Grabbing Mi Hyoran’s wrist? I did get a little angry about that, but it wasn’t enough to warrant smashing this guy’s arm.

But.

“But you know.”

The reason I was pissed off was something else.

Kwak-!

“Keuk!?”

I grabbed the guy by the neck. His body lacked strength, making it slightly difficult to lift, but I managed to hoist him up somehow.

“Even so, you shouldn’t be doing foolish things. A man shouldn’t have a loose tongue.”

“What… are you saying…”

“You son of a bitch. You passed my information to the Baekhwa Merchant Guild, didn’t you?”

“…!”

“What are you talking about…”

Namgung Jin’s body jolted at my words. That reaction was answer enough.

“What do you mean? It’s the plain truth.”

The reason I got heated.

It’s because this guy passed my information to the Baekhwa Merchant Guild.

It had been strange since earlier. The incident that happened in Hanam. The fact that the Baekhwa Merchant Guild leader knew about my revelation as a member of the Gu clan.

I wondered why that was the case.

No matter how fast information travels, spreading at this speed is strange.

How much time had passed since it happened for the information to have already spread all the way to Hanam? In this case, there was only one answer.

Carrier pigeons? No way. This was something else.

“It was you, wasn’t it? The one who passed the information.”

“…”

“Right?”

Among the people who were here, there’s the guy who passed the information.

And that’s this guy.

Mentioning my deduction, Namgung Jin’s expression became priceless.

“Ahahi, fuck.”

You should have at least tried to deny it.

“If you keep looking at me like that, I won’t believe you even if you deny it.”

“…Kkeudeuk…”

Namgung Jin scrunched up his face. I released my grip on him.

Only then did Namgung Jin collapse to his knees on the floor.

“Keok… Keok-heok…”

As if he had been suffocating, he hastily gasped for air.

“Honestly, I don’t really care whether you passed it on or not, you know?”

I continued speaking to the fallen Namgung Jin.

Well, it wasn’t like it was secret information, so I didn’t care if you sold it or not. I figured it would reach my ears eventually anyway. However.

“After selling it, swaggering around and causing trouble for everyone else is a bit much, isn’t it? Especially when it causes trouble for me.”

“…You…”

“I can’t just shave that smug face of yours clean off. Why do you keep provoking me?”

There’s only so much I can go easy on someone. The reason I was keeping this young Sword King alive and well was solely for one purpose.

It was the same reason I didn’t kill the Namgung family’s ruffian and kept him alive.

“Don’t shift the blame everywhere just because you can’t have women as you please. Find the reason within yourself, you maggot. That’s why you end up like this every day.”

“You…!”

Namgung Jin tried to struggle, but seeing that, I kicked him.

“Keok!”

“Be grateful I went easy on you by only breaking one arm. Otherwise, I would have ripped out your throat and shown it to you.”

I mean it.

That guy was lucky.

“Be thankful for your blood. If it weren’t for that, you would have already died by my hands.”

The surname Namgung.

The daughter he would have.

That’s what saves this guy.

“Anyway… Namgung family members are really lucky.”

Their lifespans are damn long.

Is it because their family is well-off? I wish my family took after them in that regard.

Tsk.

I clicked my tongue.

As I stood there, warriors approached from behind. It seemed the commotion had carried that far.

“…Sword Dragon?”

The person who was guarding the door earlier, seeing Namgung Jin with his broken arm.

Tang Cheon-gi, the Poison Dragon, looked surprised.

“What is this…”

“Could you please move that.”

“…What?”

“I’d rather not look at it, and besides, it seems like you wouldn’t like me touching it.”

“…”

He seemed unable to even guess what had happened.

However, unable to just leave him like that, Tang Cheon-gi tried to help Namgung Jin up, but.

“Let go…!”

Namgung Jin shook off Tang Cheon-gi’s hand.

“…Don’t grab me, I’ll go on my own.”

He got up with a heavily scrunched-up expression. Even with his arm broken and his condition likely poor, he seemed to be enduring it with sheer grit.

Then he looked at me.

“…”

More precisely, he seemed to be looking at Mi Hyoran, who was behind me.

At that gaze, Mi Hyoran casually turned her head away.

Seeing this, Namgung Jin turned his head and walked out.

Just as the situation seemed to have concluded.

“Well then, I should also…”

I was thinking of having a chat with mother, but then.

“Stop.”

Tang Cheon-gi blocked my path.

“Yes?”

As I looked at him questioningly, he said with a dumbfounded expression.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

“I still had a conversation I needed to finish. I was trying to wrap that up?”

“Does it make any sense to leave after creating this mess?”

“…What’s the problem? It’s over, isn’t it?”

“This was a battle fought within the Alliance. We need to grasp the situation and understand what happened, so we’re moving to the investigation room now. You’d best not resist.”

“…”

At those words, I wiped my face.

‘…That damn Namgung bastard.’

He’s useless.

Shit…

---

I was led by Tang Cheon-gi’s hand to the Alliance’s investigation room.

Perhaps because it was a place solely for investigation, as the name implied, it was filled with iron bars and walls.

“…”

Sitting there, resting my chin on my hand, I let out sigh after sigh.

I don’t know how I managed to cause such an incident on my very first day here.

‘But it was understandable to get pissed off.’

It was all Namgung Jin’s fault. It wasn’t mine.

While I was sitting there having that thought.

“What incident did you cause?”

Tang Cheon-gi asked me. The person investigating me was none other than Tang Cheon-gi himself.

Since he was a witness to the situation, he was assigned to the investigation.

“The opponent pissed me off, so I beat him up.”

“…Is that all?”

“Yes. Is any further reason needed?”

“It doesn’t need one. However, if there isn’t one, I’ll just have to throw you in jail.”

“…”

At those words, I pondered.

‘How should I put this.’

I came out of the room of the woman I like, jammed my foot into the flustered Namgung Jin’s face.

And when he tried to fight, I broke his arm.

That’s the explanation of the situation, but.

“…”

If I say this, I feel like I’ll be screwed? Instinctively, I realized this.

‘Even if I mention that the guy sold my information, will it resolve anything?’

Hmm? It’s a bit ambiguous.

If I just spilled out the situation like this, I’d just end up looking like a crazy bastard who hit on women and caused a ruckus.

“Did something happen with the Baekhwa Merchant Guild’s Young Master?”

“…Why do you think that?”

“Considering the circumstances, it seems likely.”

Wow. Smart, aren’t you?

As I couldn’t help but admire him.

“It seems similar.”

Tang Cheon-gi found the answer in my reaction.

Following that.

“Haa…”

He let out an unfathomable sigh.

“What’s so good about someone like this, really…”

“Pardon?”

“…Sword Dragon has gone into treatment. As soon as it’s finished, we’ll commence the investigation, so please wait here for now.”

Tang Cheon-gi got up.

Just leaving like this?

“No.”

He should at least let me explain.

As I tried to grab Tang Cheon-gi with that thought in mind.

Beolkeok!!

“Huh?”

“…Hmm?”

Someone appeared as the investigation room’s door opened.

“Oops.”

It was a considerably large giant of a man. He was so big that he had to bend down significantly just to enter the investigation room’s door.

“Oh dear. Anyway, everywhere is so cramped.”

The old man entered, looking displeased.

As I wondered about this unfamiliar face.

“…Heok!”

Tang Cheon-gi gasped upon seeing the old man.

“…How!”

Is he someone Tang Cheon-gi knows? I wondered who could elicit such a reaction, but then.

“It’s not you.”

The old man glanced at Tang Cheon-gi and shook his head.

“Then.”

This time, he shifted his gaze to look at me.

At that moment.

Huuk-!

A fist suddenly flew towards me.

My head whipped back from the fist that stopped right in front of my face.

I was looking at the profile of the huge fist. Not long after that.

“Mhm!”

The old man said, retrieving his fist as if satisfied.

“So it’s you. Bi-ju’s disciple, that ruffian.”

“…?”

Hearing that, I thought.

“…What is this crazy old geezer?”

“What?”

“Ah, damn.”

I should have kept that thought to myself…

I messed up.