By Zephyria 
The afternoon sunlight fluttered, tickling his closed eyelids.
Baek Ryeo-il sat leisurely in a private room on the second floor of a house of courtesans, where he could look clearly down upon the street, waiting for someone. The house of courtesans was empty of guests in the broad daylight. He liked the desolate atmosphere.
Leaning the back of his head against the wall with his eyes closed, he appeared peaceful at a glance, but that was merely a well-concealed facade; in reality, it was not so. His inner self was seething like an active volcano that could erupt at any moment.
It was frustrating that even with Seong Mu-yeon, whom he had finally tracked down, right before his eyes, he could do nothing.
Seong Mu-yeon, who had abandoned him. A man who clung desperately when he needed something, only to throw one away like a worn-out shoe once their utility was gone.
He hadn’t been unaware that the man was such a person, yet he had been deceived unconsciously.
He wanted revenge.
Some people live their lives embracing sorrow alone, unable to protest even after being used thoroughly and miserably discarded. But he was not such a person.
Someone like Baek Ryeo-il would chase those who harmed him to the ends of hell, find them eventually, and make them pay the price. Foolishly, Seong Mu-yeon had chosen the wrong opponent.
Over the past three years, he had imagined the moment of reuniting with Seong Mu-yeon countless times.
He would find him somehow and vividly return the anger and emptiness he had felt.
‘….’
…And the pain.
What had filled the void left by Seong Mu-yeon’s departure was none other than pain. A strange kind of ache, experienced for the first time in his life, tormented him every single moment.
〈Do you really think I enjoyed staying at Mount Hua?〉
Throb.
〈Who was the one who dragged me there by force when I said I hated it in the first place?〉
Throb…
〈As long as I am with the Master, it is the same wherever I go. I want to stop now.〉
Seong Mu-yeon’s final words became a dagger, stabbing his heart every moment. Having lived his entire life as a martial artist, he was accustomed to physical pain, but he did not know how to handle the pain of the heart.
Wounds inflicted on the body gradually decrease in pain over time and eventually heal.
But this pain continued endlessly.
It was a pain stemming from a powerful longing for something he could not possess. If it were an object, he could obtain it somehow; if it were martial arts, he could achieve it by devoting himself to training day and night.
But if what one desired was a person…
And specifically, a person who did not wish to be by his side, that longing transformed into pain.
Just as it is painful when one cannot eat while hungry, or agonizing when one cannot sleep while drowsy.
Baek Ryeo-il, who had lived his life following his whims, was not accustomed to enduring.
Because it was unattainable, it became pain.
Because he wanted to reach him, wanted to hold him in his sight…
He was in agony.
And because he could do nothing even though the being who caused this pain was right before him, the misery doubled.
The reunion with Seong Mu-yeon he had imagined was not like this.
There was no passionate revenge with shouting and splattering blood, nor were there desperate excuses stained with tears. Nor—though he would never admit it—was there a dream-like moment where, after a long severance, the two would finally face each other and cast everything aside to crave only each other’s lips, like a thin breeze deep within his heart.
Like a ridiculous farce in the marketplace, they were in a strange state of pretending not to know each other, deceiving and being deceived, deferred without reaching a conclusion.
Baek Ryeo-il, who thought that simply meeting Seong Mu-yeon would bring an end in some way, was gradually withering away in a situation that remained stagnant.
Nothing had been resolved refreshingly. He felt as if he were stagnating and rotting, unable to find his bearings on how to act or what position to take.
He wanted to stop now. Just as Seong Mu-yeon had said.
He was exhausted. He no longer had the strength to endure. He wanted to end this pain now.
‘I would rather he never appeared before me again… no, it would have been better if he had never appeared in my life from the start.’
Baek Ryeo-il had felt a threat from the moment he first saw him. He didn’t understand it then, but he knew now. He had instinctively known that Seong Mu-yeon’s existence would somehow destroy him.
How could he escape this misery?
He fell into anguish, staring blankly into the void.
If he thoroughly destroyed Seong Mu-yeon so that he could never rise again, just as he had been destroyed, would this feeling improve?
Or.
If he completely erased him, would this pain disappear?
The black pupils slightly revealed beneath thick eyelashes gleamed dangerously.
“I apologize for keeping you waiting.”
With the refreshing sound of the bamboo blinds hanging at the door clattering, a beautiful woman entered the private room.
“I am Gyo Hong. I am beyond delighted to meet you. Master Baek Ryeo-il, the Demon-slaying Blood Shadow.”
Gyo Hong sat naturally opposite Baek Ryeo-il with an elegant posture. She looked like nothing more than a modest young lady who would play the Seven-String Zither or write poetry, but she belonged to the Haoh Gate. Courtesans, thieves, servers—each individual held a humble, insignificant position, but the vast majority of the Central Plains consisted of such people. Their eyes and ears gathered to create a terrifying intelligence network, yet they were beings who were not particularly welcomed because of their status.
The arrogant children of Great Sects would borrow the capabilities of the Haoh Gate when necessary, yet they never placed themselves on the same level as them. That is why even the Beggar Clan, despite occupying a seat, could not enter the Nine Great Sects.
Baek Ryeo-il, conversely, preferred them. To gather information by running around personally, one had to coax people well; while someone like Jang Han-soo, who smiled warmly, might be good at it, such things did not suit his temperament. People usually grew terrified the moment they saw him.
“You are as taciturn as I heard.”
Gyo Hong smiled softly. She could have considered Baek Ryeo-il rude for not offering even the minimum social pleasantries, but perhaps because she knew his personality well, as befitting the Haoh Gate, she did not make an issue of it.
“However… it seems the wine we prepared was not to your liking.”
Her eyes widened as she noticed the wine jar on the table. The precious wine, served by the children under her command, remained exactly as it was, without a single trace of having been touched.
“Since you are a member of the Hwasan Sect who reveres the Way, it is understandable that you dismissed my child’s service, but I am deeply concerned that we of the Haoh Gate, who nominally handle information, might be holding incorrect information…”
The elegant Gyo Hong seemed genuinely worried. However, Baek Ryeo-il immediately grasped the hidden meaning behind those words.
It meant, ‘I prepared this because I heard you like wine, so why aren’t you eating it? Are you planning to find some fault later?’
Whether it was the Beggar Clan or the Haoh Gate, Baek Ryeo-il’s notoriety was high among them. He was known for showing up abruptly without prior notice, pressuring them for demanding information, and if it turned out to be incorrect, returning to wreak havoc and often taking back the information fee paid in advance.
Seeing that she was not intimidated at all despite having heard such rumors, and that she had made full preparations to welcome him from the start, it was clear that Gyo Hong was also no ordinary woman.
“I didn’t come here to drink.”
Baek Ryeo-il simply shrugged.
“More importantly, what about the information I told you to look into?”
Gyo Hong liked that Baek Ryeo-il was straightforward, getting straight to the point as if telling her to put aside the small talk. It seems it’s not the kind of wine he usually enjoys. Just how expensive is his taste?
He didn’t seem like the eccentric person described in the rumors circulating within the Sect. As someone who handled information and knew how exaggerated rumors could be, she reserved judgment about him.
“As you know, Lanzhou has a high floating population, so incidents and accidents never cease. I was a bit late because I was filtering the information that the Master might find desirable.”
Gyo Hong handed Baek Ryeo-il a scroll organized by order of importance. Without offering a word of thanks, he immediately unfurled the scroll and read. Every circumstance, person, and incident suspected of being related to the Demonic Cult within and around Lanzhou City was densely recorded.
‘Hmm.’
He’s more handsome than I thought?
Immersed in the contents of the scroll, Baek Ryeo-il had his brow slightly furrowed and his eyes cast down, and Gyo Hong’s gaze naturally drifted to his thick eyelashes.
Because the rumors were so foul, she hadn’t believed the claims that he was handsome. But seeing him in person, Baek Ryeo-il exuded not only physical beauty but also that strange charm typically emitted by someone intensely focused on one thing.
“What is the Black Manor?”
“Pardon?”
Gyo Hong, who had been unconsciously lost in admiring his beauty, snapped back to her senses.
“Ah, the Black Manor is a ghost story passed down for a long time. Decades ago, the family that owned the manor went bankrupt and fled in the middle of the night, leaving it abandoned. At some point, strange rumors began to spread that ghosts appeared, and it grew uncontrollably until it became almost an established fact. They say the ghost kidnaps and eats people. And that a massive amount of human bones are buried in the basement.”
“And?”
“It’s a rumor without substance. The government investigated several times, but they say not a single dead rat was found, let alone human bones. The owner has changed several times, and they tried to utilize the manor, but it seems it didn’t work out, perhaps due to the sinister rumors. In the end, it was left abandoned.”
“Hmm…”
Baek Ryeo-il rubbed his chin.
“Wouldn’t Kilyeon Gorge be more likely than the Black Manor? The sheer Cliffs of Heaven stretch endlessly, making accessibility poor, which makes it perfect for those who are not honorable to hide and plot sinister schemes. Recently, there were a few mountain guides who claimed to have seen lights occasionally in Kilyeon Gorge, where human footsteps should not reach.”
“I don’t know… I suspect the Black Manor more. In the center, hidden secretly. That’s exactly the kind of thing the Demonic Cult would do.”