Sichuan's Mad Dragon (Novel) - Chapter 46 - Like an Innocent Young Master
Chapter 46 – Like an Innocent Young Master
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Translated by Heavenly Cat
Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net
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When Red Beggar released the fist he had drawn back like a bowstring, the sexual predator took a direct hit to the chest and tumbled backward, his chest caved in.
Ju-seong, who had been waiting behind, immediately spun his waist and delivered a roundhouse kick to the sexual predator’s back.
“Die!”
It was not some sublime technique but purely a street thug’s kick meant to beat someone down.
No matter how hard he had studied martial arts, he was at his core a low-class man and could not help it.
It lacked finesse, but anyway, he had packed in the Flame Crow Six Stage Art’s internal energy and his hatred for the sexual predator, so it was by no means weak.
-CRACK!
The vivid sound of something breaking was heard.
“Urgh…!”
The sexual predator rolled his eyes back, foaming white at the mouth, and collapsed.
Red Beggar trudged over and grabbed the sexual predator’s hair, pulling him up.
The man’s burst power technique had finally exhausted itself. Wrinkles were spreading across his face, and the tendons in his limbs were snapping one by one.
“I chased you for so long, you bastard. Do you remember the woman surnamed Baekri you killed in Henan Province?”
The sexual predator seemed to have regained some sanity only on the verge of death. Seeing the awakened look on his face, Ju-seong realized the man had been asleep all this time.
The Sleeping Demon Moths’ toxic powder must have put his mind to sleep, while the burst power technique kept his body moving.
So he had fought in a dream-like daze.
Up until this very moment, he must have been grappling with vengeful spirits in his dreams, not even knowing who he was fighting.
Ju-seong let out an empty sigh.
The answer to Red Beggar’s question came.
“Baekri? Henan Province? Ha, should I remember such things? Do you remember every meal you have eaten?”
Red Beggar’s features twisted completely. With his lower face covered by the mask, he looked almost like he was smiling.
A bizarre laugh flowed from his lips.
“Heh heh, heh heh heh, a bastard like you would not want to die. You still have more evil to do while alive. Let me tell you…”
A milky-white energy gathered at Red Beggar’s fingers.
“I shall make you beg for death like a traveler in the wasteland seeking water, like a beggar begging for alms.”
Cruel light streamed from his pupils, and at that moment, Ju-seong placed his hand on Red Beggar’s shoulder.
“Red Beggar.”
“Brother, do not stop me. I do not want to hear it right now.”
-SMACK!
At Red Beggar’s words, Ju-seong smacked the back of his head.
Of course, this was not Red Beggar’s first killing.
But because it seemed he would cross a line he should not cross with this killing, Ju-seong intervened.
Ju-seong hurled abuse at Red Beggar, who was staring at him incredulously while rubbing his head.
“You insolent punk, you sense-deprived beggar bastard. Did you catch him alone? Anyone would think you fought and caught him all by yourself. What a joke. If you are going to ignore the words of someone who helped you with your revenge, quit living as a human and live as a beast here in the jungle. Mating with moths, making friends with nature. You bastard with no manners, no gratitude.”
“Damn it, what do you want! I have the right to do this. Do I not?”
“Red Beggar. Having the heart for revenge is not bad. But when taking a person’s life, let us at least kill with the heart of a righteous hero slaying an evildoer.”
“…What does that mean?”
“If you kill with a heart of revenge… Furthermore, with a heart of hatred, a heart seeking fame, a heart seeking to become stronger, a heart seeking to become a hegemon, you will keep killing. Do you want to become a hegemon and swallow the world?”
“…That is not it. What would I.”
“Then let us be satisfied with the heart of a righteous hero. Killing evildoers so that fewer innocents die, something like that… Calmly and cleanly killing.”
Red Beggar looked at Ju-seong with a bewildered expression, and the sprawled sexual predator also stared at Ju-seong as if dumbfounded. Caught in a crossfire of stares like whips, Ju-seong remained shameless and bold.
Red Beggar slowly exhaled and spoke.
“Rather than thinking of revenge… Thinking of saving those this bastard would harm in the future. Right?”
“Exactly that. I really do not want to kill him, but there is truly no other choice, that kind of feeling? Like a naive young master of a martial world noble family on his debut…”
Ju-seong thought.
Even if they were a performer and a beggar, worn down to the bone by seeing all the world’s filth…
At times like this, they had to become innocent young masters.
Red Beggar steadied his breathing and squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them.
The sexual predator chuckled and mocked the two.
“A pair of idiots spouting nonsense together. Hahaha…”
But the laughter could not last long.
Mockery only worked when there was a crowd to mock along with you.
For the first time in his life, the sexual predator felt something called loneliness.
Because there was no one to mock the world with him…
Meanwhile, Red Beggar tried to adopt the heart of a merciful Buddha, a righteous hero, following Ju-seong’s advice.
It did not go well. Because that was not who Red Beggar was.
But since he only needed to steady his heart for that brief moment of killing, he managed somehow.
With a face like an upset bodhisattva, Red Beggar brought down his whitish palm.
-THUD!
The last thing the sexual predator heard was the sound of his own crown bone shattering absurdly easily.
Having finished the task, Red Beggar pulled out a straw rope from his bundle and wrapped it around his waist. This made three straw ropes tied at his waist.
“What is that? Why are you wearing three belts? Is your stomach bad lately? Cannot hold your bowels? Shall I make you some medicine?”
Red Beggar let out a soft sigh and answered.
“You just cannot stop the nonsense, being a performer. This here, I tie one more every time I kill a really bad guy, meaning a bastard I acknowledge as evil.”
“Is that so? At that rate, even a waist a full jang (3 meters) long would not be enough. By old age, you will have to wrap them around your head too. Seems like a habit you made wanting your own trademark in your impetuous youth; you should have thought about the future when making it.”
Ju-seong nagged harder to keep Red Beggar from falling into useless sentimentality.
“Oh really. Do you take me for a fool? Obviously, I only add a knot when the opponent is at least equal or stronger than the previous one.”
Ju-seong nodded and fell silent.
At that rate, he probably would not tie more than a few knots in his lifetime. Less than ten, probably. No matter how much he lived like a fighting dog.
Not every fight guaranteed an opponent stronger than the last.
‘This fellow is screwed. His next opponent has to be at least a full peak-level martial artist to tie a new knot. And the bastard has to be a major asshole too…’
Thinking such thoughts, Ju-seong naturally lowered his gaze and began examining the fallen sexual predator’s corpse.
He noticed a small hole in the man’s neck.
“What is this now. Looks like something passed under the skin…”
It was quite an unpleasant sight, but Ju-seong had a strong stomach.
Just as he was about to examine more closely, the crushed head of the sexual predator began to strangely writhe.
-Squelch.
The sunken part bulged and swelled, and boils and tumors grew wildly. As the scalp swelled, the hair naturally spread apart and became sparse.
Even for Ju-seong, this was a frown-inducing sight.
Red Beggar had already turned his head the other way and was dry heaving.
“How is a beggar so…”
Ju-seong had been about to scold him but stopped, feeling his own stomach churning.
“We have to just set this on fire or something, damn…”
Grumbling, Ju-seong suddenly stiffened his expression.
A faint sound that could not be ignored was caught by his sensitive ears.
A subtly grating sound at the edge of human hearing, a strange wind noise.
-Flutter…
A feeling as if the entire deep, dark forest was being pressed down by oppression, making way for some unknown entity.
“…!”
Seeing the shrubs and branches over there swaying, Ju-seong grabbed Red Beggar’s arm and pulled.
“What? What…”
No sooner had Ju-seong yanked Red Beggar down flat than a gale full of grey toxic powder swept through the area.
-WHOOOOSH…!
Ju-seong held his mouth and nose shut and held his breath with all his might, yet felt the medicine soaked in his clothes rapidly being used up.
‘Damn, it is him.’
The leader of the moths.
The king of the southern jungle was here.
Ju-seong and Red Beggar stood up and started running without needing to coordinate. Red Beggar was running on all fours altogether.
Ten-Thousand-Li Roving Hound…
A dog that guarded a house in Kaifeng, Henan Province, had run ten thousand li to reach Yunnan Province, and all he got was hardship.
‘Is this why they say leaving home is suffering?’
But a man of the martial world was one who gained more from hardship.
What he felt in this experience of outrunning a wildfire was a sudden realization. “Fire is this fast indeed. I did not know fire could run this fast.”
“Shut up and run! Control your breathing!”
Red Beggar was absolutely right, so Ju-seong kept his mouth shut and focused on running.
Ju-seong could see all sorts of beasts fleeing madly around them.
Deer and wolves, leopards and squirrels were all fleeing as one with a single purpose.
He could not sense how far the creature was following them because it made almost no sound.
Not knowing for certain made his backside itch.
Ju-seong suddenly giggled, and Red Beggar exploded.
“Damn it, Brother! Is this the time to laugh!”
“Oh, sorry. It itches.”
“What the hell!”
Ju-seong kept concentrating on the Celestial Hearing while running to track the moth’s location.
He could not use the Celestial Nose; it was useless in this situation, and if he deliberately inhaled, he would go straight to dreamland.
Ju-seong sensed that the creature was deliberately adjusting its direction bit by bit to herd them.
It was herding them continuously so they could not escape toward the forest’s edge.
“This thing is trying to make us go in circles.”
“Is there no way?”
“Let us take comfort in the fact that the small ones are not coming out anymore. Positive thinking.”
“This is maddening.”
As Ju-seong said, the small moths were no longer appearing, probably because the leader moth was controlling its subordinates to prevent their sacrifice.
Ju-seong gritted his teeth once, then braked with his feet and naturally turned around.
“Brother, why!”
“I am going to fight. I do not think there is any other way.”
“Ah, this is… I do not know if it will work.”
Ju-seong did not answer, just stared at the direction the moth was approaching.
-Flap. Flap.
The unpleasantly quiet wingbeats echoed among the trees. What soon appeared was a moth so huge it was hard to believe it had been flying among the trees.
Its wingspan, spreading left and right, looked to be at least three jang.
“Ah… For crying out loud.”
Red Beggar cursed from behind. His dog-beating staff was already ruined and thrown away.
Since staff techniques made up half of his repertoire, the absence of a weapon was somewhat critical.
Ju-seong also licked his lips in consternation, spinning the needles he held one in each hand between his fingers.
-Flutter, flutter.
The moth, perched on a nearby tree, lightly fluttered its wings and scattered toxic powder.
The toxic powder from its body was on a different level from the others. The small ones’ powder was a dark blackish-grey.
But the leader’s was a grey infinitely close to white.
Naturally, the effect was incomparably stronger.
Ju-seong felt his mind grow hazy without realizing it.
‘Ah, I must have inhaled a bit.’
The situation was going to hell before the fight even started.
His mind hazy, Ju-seong shouted randomly.
“You damnable winged bug, hey, you! Do you think I will fall asleep! Not a chance. You bewitching thing. Do not flutter those wings so coquettishly. I am getting dizzy.”
It was a stern scolding befitting the word rebuke. Of course, a mere insect would not understand.
Anyway, shouting cleared his head a bit.
Red Beggar quietly rolled his eyes from beside him.
‘Why is he like this, really.’