Pay‑to‑Win King of Martial Arts (Novel) - Chapter 124 - Land of the Blind (3)

Chapter 124 – Land of the Blind (3)

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Translated by Heavenly Cat

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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Cases like this happened sometimes. Cases where an entire village moved in order to strip a single person bare.

Which meant that every inn being full each time we looked for a good one had all been part of their design.

Even so, when an entire village moved like that, it was usually a small village. This was Lanzhou, the provincial capital of Gansu. For the provincial capital itself to move like this was something that almost never happened.

In a provincial capital stood the Provincial Administration Commission, and public order was usually fairly good. It certainly could not be called normal for black-path men to run wild like this in such a place.

“Follow me.”

The blind man walked with loose, wandering steps. Seen from behind, his gait was so unhesitating that it was hard to believe he was blind.

The reason we had been targeted was simple. It was because we were wearing expensive clothes.

Had we known Gansu was steeped in black-path elements like this, we would of course have changed clothes, but we hadn’t known, so nothing could be done about it.

This inn seemed to be one of their work sites. The blind man did not go outside the building. Rather, he entered deeper inside, into the kitchen. There was probably some sort of hidden passage there.

Seeing the filthy kitchen, with mold growing in places and rat corpses in view, made me want to vomit back up the food I had just put in my mouth.

Glancing back, I saw Myeong-il expressionless, while Yeo Hong-yang, who had grown up in comfort, looked pale as though he were suppressing retching.

Just as I had expected, there was a door in one corner of the kitchen that at a glance looked like nothing more than a wall. The door connected to a stairway descending underground.

There was no luminous pearl, and no proper handhold either. It was the kind of staircase where a misstep would send you tumbling down to die far from home.

At that moment Myeong-il held out his hand first to Yeo Hong-yang. Since Myeong-il was at least a martial artist, if he strengthened his eyesight with internal energy he could at least make out shapes, so he was volunteering to serve as a handrail. Yeo Hong-yang took Myeong-il’s hand with an embarrassed expression.

The staircase descended so far it almost seemed endless. The darkness stayed the same, but the damp, musty smell told us we were continuing ever deeper underground.

“How much farther down are we going?”

In the end, I was the one who complained. Ever since stepping onto these stairs, I had been roughly keeping time.

We had now been descending the stairs for nearly half a shijin. On top of that, the height of the steps was inconsistent, so I had nearly slipped several times.

“Are you in such a hurry as if going to a festival? Don’t worry. We’re almost there.”

Fortunately, the blind man was not the sort who lied idly. We soon reached the bottom of the staircase of darkness.

To my astonishment, at the bottom of the stairs there was an intricately carved stone cavern. The cavern had passages wide enough for a single person to walk through, high ceilings, and several rooms.

The strange thing was that the cavern walls were decorated with oddly shaped stones. Elsewhere too, in the middle of forked paths, there were pagoda-like stone stacks made from stones of similar shape. Yeo Hong-yang blankly stroked one of the walls.

“To think there was a place like this in Gansu.”

I too was surprised. Small lamps hung here and there from the walls of the cavern, and after being in darkness so complete that one could see nothing at all, even that faint light felt welcome.

“Don’t touch things carelessly. There could be poison on them, or mechanisms could be set off.”

I warned Yeo Hong-yang. Startled, Yeo Hong-yang snatched his hand back and brushed it off. Perhaps hearing our exchange, the blind man smiled.

“Heh heh. There are no poisons or mechanisms. Though you might earn yourself some resentment.”

“Resentment?”

“Because these walls are all packed with bones. Shinbones and calf bones.”

“Hup.”

Yeo Hong-yang shuddered. Then he began furiously rubbing his hand against his clothes.

Since I had already guessed it was some sort of space with an unpleasant purpose, I was not greatly shocked.

“Then this place must have been used as a grave.”

“It was.”

I looked up at the ceiling. Certainly, the space was far too precise and too large to think these black-path men had built it by joining forces. This space had to be at least a hundred years old. These black-path people had likely done no more than occupy and use it.

“If you die here, there’d be no need for a coffin at all.”

“Are you speaking about yourself?”

The blind man gave a displeased laugh, but I did not answer.

Following the blind man, we walked through the cavern that was also a grave. It had so many forks that it looked as though we could easily lose our way if anything happened.

After passing several junctions, we came upon a large plaza-like space. The ceiling of the plaza was hollowed inward in the shape of a triangular pillar. In the hollow was set a large luminous pearl, and the light it emitted was enough to illuminate the entire plaza.

A great number of black-path men were already gathered in the plaza. Each and every one of them glared at us with bulging eyes.

“So the rich young lords have arrived.”

At the center of the plaza was a grotesque chair made from skulls. Sitting in it was another blind man, likewise with white eyes.

“So you’re the head of the black-path dogs here.”

At my aggressive words, the pressure of the black-path men’s glares grew even stronger. The blind man seated there spoke in a low voice.

“Head, you say. It seems you still haven’t grasped your own situation.”

“At least it isn’t eyes. Since you can’t even see in front of you. Hahaha.”

Because the ceiling was high, my laughter echoed hollowly. Naturally, there was no one here with enough empathy to laugh along.

“So is the name of your sect the Blind Sect? Or is the entry requirement that you gouge your eyes out before coming?”

My words were half joke and half earnest. The older-looking men here mostly had white eyes, or else had no eyes at all.

“You’ve lost the ability to fear.”

The blind man sitting in the skull chair rose to his feet.

Though he was blind, not a single person moved to help him up. That alone told me how accustomed he was to this place.

“If you live long enough in this hell, you’ll understand too. That eyes are organs better absent than present.”

That did seem likely enough. Only this plaza had a luminous pearl, while the corridors beyond held not a shred of light without the lamps. The ones with open eyes were likely those who had entered later, once lamps existed, while the blind ones were those who had lived here from the beginning.

And the very fact that they had lived in such a grave already reflected their unclean pasts.

“So, why did you want to see me?”

“What else? Money. Even we who have been cast out by the world still need the world’s money.”

“How much do you need?”

“Put down as much as your lives are precious. You’re youngsters with a fair bit of money, aren’t you?”

From that line alone, I became certain they had not brought us here because they knew our identities.

“Ah!”

At that moment, Yeo Hong-yang pointed. Looking where he was indicating, I saw the very black-path men who had been threatening the child earlier. When Myeong-il saw them too, his eyes widened.

There was one reason even Myeong-il, who rarely looked surprised, was startled. The child who had been beaten to a pulp like a dog was standing there beside the black-path men.

“Th, that…”

Yeo Hong-yang’s face reddened with a sense of betrayal. Myeong-il too glared at them as if he wanted to kill them.

In truth, I had already known that the child and the black-path men were in the same gang. It wasn’t as though I had never seen a swindle like that, one that preyed on pity.

Even when Myeong-il and Yeo Hong-yang had clashed, I had deliberately said nothing because of experience. It would be quite a meaningful experience for both Myeong-il and Yeo Hong-yang.

“Frauds!”

Yeo Hong-yang bit his lip. He had now understood. Those black-path men had not just come to extort money. They had been the advance party, sent to test the state of our purses. Since if one could pull out fifteen taels of silver without hesitation, one was wealthy enough.

“It wasn’t your fault.”

I placed a hand on Yeo Hong-yang’s trembling shoulder.

It seemed Yeo Hong-yang had sunk into self-loathing for being deceived, along with guilt over having brought us into this situation by pulling out money for no reason. But from my point of view, it wasn’t his fault. It was simply a matter of insufficient experience.

“And why is it not his fault? He flaunted money rashly without even knowing who the other side was.”

The blind man who had risen from the chair chuckled. Leaning on a great Zen staff such as only an eminent monk might carry, he approached us.

“One little brat and two young men. Two will stay here, and one will go out and bring back the money. If one day is late, I’ll cut off an ear. If two days are late, an arm. If three days, a leg. If five days, the head.”

All the blind men began releasing their pressure.

I turned back. The faces of both Myeong-il and Yeo Hong-yang had gone pale. That was because the pressure was no small thing.

“You two stay here and don’t fight. I’ll negotiate.”

“Hahaha. So you’ll be the one who stays? Fine, then we’ll do it that way.”

Blind men came at ghostlike speed and seized Myeong-il’s and Yeo Hong-yang’s arms. The two of them resisted with leaps and struggles, but those men were far superior to them in skill.

“W, wait a moment. All of a sudden like this?”

“Trust me.”

“No, forget trusting or not. What are you going to do?”

Yeo Hong-yang stammered in confusion. Myeong-il, on the other hand, stayed calm.

“Yes. In a situation like this, you’re the one among us who’s most trustworthy.”

“Daoist. Are you really just going along with this?”

“There’s nothing we can do.”

“That’s true, but still.”

Yeo Hong-yang hesitated, then sighed. In the end, he seemed to have given up.

“Come quickly. I don’t want my ears cut off.”

In the end, Yeo Hong-yang and Myeong-il were dragged away by the blind men and vanished into the darkness. They would probably be locked up elsewhere.

After confirming they were gone, I slowly opened my mouth.

“When I see bastards like you, making money in such cowardly ways, I feel sick to death. Bastards like you treat money as something sacred, and the act of earning it as something base. A merchant is exactly the reverse.”

At my words, a smile touched the lips of the blind man.

“So you were a merchant. Then you must have quite a lot of money.”

“The act of earning money is something sacred, and money itself is base. I’ve always wanted to kill bastards like you who earn it in such vile ways.”

The other black-path men began to snicker and laugh as well. The blind man who had guided me here mocked me too.

“Do you know who that is? He is called the Mara Blood Buddha in the Central Plains. One of the survivors of the Demonic Cult, the same Demonic Cult your Central Plains people fear so much.”

I had no idea who the Mara Blood Buddha was. I didn’t know Demonic Cult people well. But I did know that the black-path men of Gansu were tied to the Demonic Cult.

My sharpened sense for qi had been feeling demonic qi from them. Because my demonic qi had been strengthened by elixirs, I could sense it from them the moment I first saw them. That was why I had been certain the child and the black-path men were in league, and why I had also known when the people began streaming into the inn.

Because every last one of them had been giving off demonic qi.

For some reason, every single black-path man in Gansu possessed demonic qi. And that was also why I had come down here with confidence.

“You’ll regret laying a hand on me.”

I drew my sword and pointed it at the blind man. The laughter of the black-path men only grew louder.

“And what exactly are you supposed to be?”

I took something out from my robes. It was the token of an Embroidered Uniform Guard censor.

“You may not be able to see it, but I’m a censor of the Embroidered Uniform Guard.”

“Oh?”

At my words, the black-path men’s laughter subsided. One of the men who still had his eyes open spoke.

“That really does look like an Embroidered Uniform Guard censor’s token.”

“Heh heh, heh heh heh. What great fortune.”

The blind man laughed loudly.

“The Superintendent will be pleased.”

“Just as I thought.”

I nodded. That was the line I had wanted to hear, the reason I had taken out the censor’s token. That’s right. These were the true culprits behind the disappearance of the Embroidered Uniform Guard’s censors, and they were the hands and feet of Prince Xian.

I burst the Primordial Mixed Qi within my body and scattered it through the plaza. The expressions of the black-path men turned strange in an instant.

They would be feeling something odd. It was neither demonic qi nor spiritual qi, yet it carried a strangely familiar note. Because the demonic qi I possessed was the progenitor of all demonic qi.

“You, what are you?”

“What else would I be?”

For the first time, the corners of the blind man’s mouth, which had not stopped smiling until now, returned to their proper place.

“The cleaner who’s going to sweep trash like you away.”

Now it was my turn to smile.