Sichuan's Mad Dragon (Novel) - Chapter 18 - The Black Dragon Gang of Sichuan

Chapter 18 – The Black Dragon Gang of Sichuan

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Translated by Heavenly Cat

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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If poison can become medicine.

Can killing become saving?

“What kind of nonsense is that? Want to get hit, disciple?”

The Divine Physician could not easily answer his disciple’s question, so he first rebuked him to buy time.

This was because what his disciple said was not wrong. His disciple explained his words again.

“No, is it not true? You know too, Master. There are people who deserve to be beaten to death. If you kill those demonic heads, would that not be saving lives?”

However, the Divine Physician also had something to say as a master.

“As you say, by taking the life of one evildoer, you might save a hundred commoners. But if I had lived with such thinking, would I have saved you back then?”

“…”

The Divine Physician admonished him with sunken eyes.

“Remember this. I will not deny that killing can also become saving. But that fact must not become justification for murder. Those who think that way become monsters. Those monsters are the ones who disturb the world.”

He had seen people who babbled about sacrificing the few for the many, and those who proclaimed that the sacrifice of the innocent was unavoidable for a righteous cause. They were people who turned away from proper morality.

The Divine Physician had seen too many such people. He hoped his disciple would not grow into a crafty villain.

His disciple answered in a heavy tone.

“…I will remember.”

* * *

“Go down and buy some food. Do not forget to buy white liquor.”

White liquor from Sichuan was unrivaled. Especially the white liquor from the distillery in this area was clean and flavorless, and left no hangover.

It was routine for Ju-seong to buy white liquor whenever he went on errands.

Since the Divine Physician’s quadrangle was in the mountains, the provisions could not be met just from a small vegetable garden and occasional hunting.

So Ju-seong would go down to the village every month or two to buy groceries.

“Brother Gu, please give me one seom of rice.”

Ju-seong was a man who thought every moment was an extension of training. He deliberately carried an A-frame rather than a pushcart, and with one seom of rice plus pork on his back, he traveled between the quadrangle and the village below using lightfoot techniques.

Therefore, as his level rose, the intervals between his visits to the village naturally grew longer.

The man called Brother Gu was a grain merchant in the village below, and he had been acquainted with Ju-seong for nearly a year.

“You look more strapping every time I see you. Is your uncle doing well?”

“He is too healthy, that is the problem.”

Ju-seong had introduced himself as an herb gatherer living in seclusion in the mountains with his uncle.

Since from the start, the Divine Physician had introduced himself that way to the villagers.

Originally, Jiulong Mountain, where the Divine Physician lived, had steep terrain and strong natural energy, so quite a few herb gatherers lived there, and there was no reason to raise suspicion.

Brother Gu laughed heartily and placed a heavy rice sack on Ju-seong’s A-frame. Ju-seong cut a long piece of silver with scissors and handed it over.

Brother Gu, after weighing the silver on a scale, looked slightly admiring and said.

“Precise. Exactly half a tael… It amazes me every time. How do you cut silver so accurately? Is there a trick?”

“There is a way for everything.”

Of course, it was possible thanks to his senses as a martial artist. Brother Gu did not bat an eye at Ju-seong casually carrying one seom of rice, yet found cutting silver precisely amazing.

This was because good peddlers and porters could sometimes carry one seom of rice alone.

Having bought the rice, Ju-seong decided to stop by the Ilmi Inn on the way to the butcher shop for a bite.

Ju-seong had been a drifter on the streets, so he was not picky about food. Though the monotonous diet in the mountains was no major complaint, eating proper cooking when he came to the village was a great pleasure.

Gongbao Chicken.

A dish of stir-fried chicken with all kinds of spicy seasonings and vegetables, it was one of the Ilmi Inn’s signature dishes.

Sichuanese people were generally picky eaters, so one could not run an inn business in Sichuan with half-baked skills.

At that moment, a group of men with swords strapped to their waists entered through the inn’s door.

“Innkeeper. Come out now. Time to pay protection fees.”

Ju-seong watched what they were doing. The innkeeper of the Ilmi Inn handed silver coins to them as if accustomed to it.

They were obviously dark path people, but dropping informal speech to the innkeeper who was old enough to be their father, and taxing people for taxes that the government had already collected, was not to his liking at all.

‘Do they think they are constables?’

Ju-seong watched them while chewing his Gongbao Chicken. Since he had not come down to the village for a month or two recently, he did not know that a new dark path group had set up in this area.

They glanced at Ju-seong’s table, then placed an order.

“Hey, give us five servings of Gongbao Chicken too. And three bottles of the cheapest liquor.”

Then they threw a few copper coins at the waiter. Ju-seong watched the scene and muttered to himself.

‘Unexpectedly, they pay for their food, so one point added. Deduct 350 points for the rude attitude of throwing money…’

It was quite a biased evaluation, but Ju-seong had bad feelings toward the dark path, so it could not be helped.

Naturally, the coins rolled at the waiter’s feet. The waiter seemed to have some temper, as he grimaced sharply while picking up the coins.

Honestly, Ju-seong would have been upset too.

One of the dark path men drawled.

“Hey pup, you upset?”

The waiter picked up the coins silently and retorted.

“No.”

“Hey pup, pup waiter. Relax your face. Your bros here are scary.”

The waiter, called Hwang-gu, forced himself to compose his expression and stood up, tucking the coins in his pocket.

“Brothers, is there anything else you need?”

“Yeah, there is. Come here.”

“Ah, yes.”

When Hwang-gu approached the table…

-Jjak!

A slap flew immediately. It was not infused with internal energy, purely meant to humiliate the other person.

“Pup. We are going to be seeing each other’s faces from now on, would it not be nicer to see smiling faces? Hm? Why are you doing this to me? Why make me the bad guy?”

“I am sorry.”

“Why sorry? If we did not pay, that would be awful, right? But I paid. When a customer pays, is not taking the money the waiter’s job? Why is your expression so crappy while doing your job? Hm?”

“I am sorry.”

Anew, Hwang-gu felt like crying at how dirty and petty his situation was. You had to apologize even when you had nothing to apologize for, that was being a waiter.

But the dark path man had no interest in the waiter’s pitiful circumstances.

“You should not be sorry!”

-Jjak!

Slaps flew repeatedly.

“Why! Are! You! Like! This! Just! Talk! To! Me!”

Naturally, he was not really asking.

Every time his words cut off, a slap flew, and Hwang-gu’s face began to swell miserably.

Even so, Hwang-gu did not cry or show fear, because even as a waiter, he was a Sichuan man. He just kept his head down and took the hits while repeating that he was sorry.

Repeating it mechanically, tonelessly, like a parrot was his only form of resistance.

Ju-seong, watching the scene, thought indeed, he was a Sichuan man.

Meanwhile, there was no trace of a Sichuan accent from the dark path men. From this, Ju-seong guessed they were outsiders who had rolled in from another region.

On the side, the dark path men snickered as if watching a good show, and the one doing the hitting seemed quite puffed up, thinking he had shown a formidably crazed image.

‘What a pathetic sight.’

Ju-seong quietly chewed his chicken and thought of the Divine Physician’s advice.

-Those who should be killed, shatter their limbs and break their dantians. Those whose limbs should be shattered and whose dantians should be broken, stop at beating them up. Those who should be beaten, hold back a little and let them go.

This was a code of conduct for the martial world. He said that if you kept holding back like that, all grudges would fade a little at a time.

This meant he could live a safer life compared to other martial world people, so it was a benefit.

In Ju-seong’s view, those fellows deserved death but not quite that much, and were fellows who deserved to have their limbs shattered. Why were they not death-worthy? First, because though they were beating the waiter, they were not trying to kill him.

Second, because he knew the martial world was full of worse fellows than them. If these guys deserved death, he would not know what to do about those even worse.

His master said if they deserved to have their limbs shattered, he should hold back once and beat them appropriately…

“They deserve a beating.”

When Ju-seong muttered that aloud without realizing it, the dark path men all turned to look at him.

The man who had been diligently beating Hwang-gu glared at Ju-seong and drawled.

“Did you say something, handsome young master? Could you repeat that for me?”

Mocking courtesy was a signature technique of lowly dark path men.

Ju-seong stared back at the man, then remembered that he was not yet a great master. Of course, by his own judgment, he was confident he could beat those five without much effort.

But the martial world was a place where unexpected things happened frequently.

There might be an overwhelmingly powerful master among them, so Ju-seong decided to act cautiously for now.

He put on a frightened act and raised both hands.

“I did not say anything. I was thinking and it just slipped out. I am sorry, sir.”

“Sorry? Is sorry enough? How will you compensate for the wound in my heart?”

A pathetic dark path man earnestly spread his shoulders as he approached Ju-seong. He seemed to want to look big, like a dim peacock.

Ju-seong sat still and looked up at the man.

“Youngster, do you not know that if you wag your tongue wrong at a martial artist, that tongue might get ripped out? That Hwang-gu over there got his cheeks swollen raw for making one wrong face. How many hits should you take for spouting off?”

“What I said was not directed at you, sir. Why are you doing this?”

“Why, you ask? Ha ha, let me tell you why. I, Gu Yang-chu, the Third Education Captain of the great Black Dragon Gang, will tell you…”

Gu Yang-chu could not continue.

Because when chopsticks are stuck in your eyes, screaming takes priority over finishing your sentence.

The moment Ju-seong heard the name Black Dragon Gang, he immediately extended his right hand and executed the first technique of the Three Yang Fist, Yellow Crow Golden Whip Fist.

Originally, as the name suggests, it was a technique using the fist. But Ju-seong did not throw a fist.

He extended his right hand holding the chopsticks and stuck one chopstick into each of the man’s eyes.

“Kkaaahak!”

The dark path man clutched his face and staggered. Ju-seong, taking the spattering blood straight on, said.

“Why are there so many Black Dragon Gangs in the martial world? You like black dragons? Black dragons are originally divine beasts that bring rain and help the people’s livelihood, but you are the opposite.”

Ju-seong said this as he pulled the chopsticks from the man’s eyes. Then he held them out toward the dark path men, showing what was skewered on them.

“Here, take these. Candied hawthorns. Bastards like you should eat candied hawthorns.”

He cracked a silly pun.

But the dark path men did not seem amused at all. They immediately roared and charged at Ju-seong.

Ju-seong threw the two eye-skewered chopsticks and stuck them into both thighs of the man charging first.

“Kkeo!”

When his thigh tendons were cut, the man let out a short scream and toppled forward.

Then he grabbed a chair behind him and swung it in a “hit whoever” manner, and the dark path men, not being fools, leapt back and dodged.

However, the man who had been toppling forward had half his face shredded and was flung sideways.

Ju-seong examined the shattered chair bristling with sharp splinters and said.

“Brother Hwang, the inn chairs are worn out. They are crumbly and weak, so if a portly customer sits down, his rear might get torn.”

The waiter Hwang-gu, belatedly realizing “Brother Hwang” referred to him, replied. Few people used such an address when calling a waiter.

“I will tell the innkeeper to have them replaced.”

“Good. The Ilmi Inn has excellent chicken dishes, so it would be sad if someone got hurt because of a chair and you could not do business anymore.”

“True words.”

Hwang-gu nodded as if that made sense. Looking at the collapsed dark path man, wooden splinters were stuck all over his cheek. Indeed, the chairs did seem crumbly and old.

Actually, Ju-seong was talking around it because he did not want to pay for breaking the inn’s chair.

He turned his head and watched the remaining three. They also watched Ju-seong.

Two had already gone down in brutal form, so they needed to be careful too.

The inn entered a lull.