Chapter 20 : Fairness and Unfairness

Chapter 20: Fairness and Unfairness

● ● ●

Somewhere in the Central Plains.

It was an underground cavern exuding a dark and eerie atmosphere.

At the very center of the cavern stood a massive dais, upon which hung a crimson curtain. It was obvious that someone was inside, yet the arrangement was made so that no one could see within.

No one knew who it was, but even without confirming the face of the one behind the curtain, it was clear that this person was the master of this place.

Around the dais, one hundred figures dressed in black robes were prostrated flat on the ground. All of them had their heads bowed, making their faces impossible to discern.

Even so, the fact that they were masters was unmistakable. The formless pressure emanating from the black-clad figures threatened to suffocate the entire underground cavern.

Just where was this place?

Who was the figure behind the curtain?

Exactly who was it, to be able to command as many as a hundred such formidable masters?

Could there be this many supreme experts even in Shaolin, said to be the pinnacle of the martial world? Or perhaps within Heavenly Demon Castle, reputed to be the strongest single faction in Murim?

No— even if those two were combined, it still seemed impossible. That was how extraordinary the presence of those gathered here was, and how staggering their number.

Enough time passed for a cup of tea to be finished, but they were still prostrated before the man.

“How long remains until the Orthodox–Demonic Confrontation?”

At last, a voice flowed out from behind the curtain. It was a bizarre voice, impossible to tell whether it belonged to a man or a woman, young or old.

“Two years remain.”

One of the prostrated figures answered.

“Two years, huh. Then it is time to slowly begin the Grand Design. Mad Cloud.”

The voice behind the curtain called the one who had answered by the name Mad Cloud.

“Yes. Please give your command, Martial Origin.”

Mad Cloud addressed the one behind the curtain as Martial Origin.

“Begin the First Stratagem. Immediately.”

The First Stratagem. Since the Grand Design had been mentioned earlier, this clearly referred to the very first step of that plan.

“Yes, Martial Origin. I will carry it out at once.”

With those words, Mad Cloud vanished from the spot as if extinguished. It was a truly spine-chilling movement technique.

And then,

Ninety-nine more figures wearing the same attire as Mad Cloud still had not raised their heads.

Lastly,

There was the supreme being behind the curtain who commanded them all: Martial Origin.

Martial Origin.

The very root of martial arts.

What an arrogantly audacious name.

Since the beginning of Murim’s history, there had been those who used grand epithets such as Martial Emperor, Heavenly Demon, or Supreme Lord of Murim, yet no one had ever dared to call himself the Origin itself.

Just how extraordinary was he, really? If it were merely the groundless delusion of a madman, that would have been for the best. But looking at the ninety-nine peerless masters prostrated here, it was clear beyond doubt that he possessed power worthy of that arrogantly audacious name.

At this very moment, a secret organization unknown to anyone in Murim had begun to move in utmost secrecy.

What, then, was their objective?

It was not yet known.

However, there was something even they did not know.

That was...

The existence of Dong Bong-su, the greatest ‘bug’ in this Murim—no, in all of Murim Online.

A cauldron stands when it has three legs, and it also stands when it has four legs, and it even stands when it has only one leg.

But the time when a cauldron stands the most firmly is...

When it has no legs at all.

A legless cauldron can never topple.

What Dong Bong-su needed was a cauldron that would not fall, not legs of any sort.

If the lengths did not match and caused it to wobble, then all he had to do was cut them off.

That was Dong Bong-su’s ‘tripod’ balance.

● ● ●

Thud, shwaaak, thud, shwaaak.

Deep in the mountains of Bongyang Mountain, someone was digging with a shovel.

Someone? Who on earth could it be, handling a shovel with such practiced ease? A carpenter? A potter? Or perhaps a grave digger?

None of those.

It was Dong Bong-su, out on a leisurely walk. Beside him, as always, Yeoro let out a low fluttering snort and watched him with indifferent eyes, offering silent support.

Thud, shwaaak, thud, shwaaak.

The steady sound of digging echoing through the mountains was just as mechanical and unfeeling as Dong Bong-su himself.

Even as he dug an unnamed someone’s grave, his mind was spinning rapidly. How much did his Thrust proficiency increase with each stab of the shovel? And how much did his Throw proficiency increase when he flung the dug-up earth to the side?

His brain did not rest for even a moment.

Thud.

The shovel sank deep into the ground. Thrust proficiency increased by 0.031%.

Shwaaak.

The soil left the shovel and flew toward the artificially piled mound beside him, raising the height of the little hill by that much. Throw proficiency increased by 0.031%.

Thud, shwaaak, thud, shwaaak....

Dong Bong-su’s movements continued in the same posture for a long time.

Then, at some point, the seemingly endless digging finally came to a halt.

Dong Bong-su’s gaze shifted down into the deeply dug pit. The culprit that had made him stop digging was grotesquely exposing its body above the soil.

White and hard, with not a trace of flesh no matter how closely one looked at it. It was a fragment of bone.

It was a kind of ‘milestone,’ marking that the pit had now reached a depth suitable for burying a corpse. Beside that marker, beneath the unseen soil, dozens of corpses would be rotting away in the same manner—white and grotesque.

This place was a graveyard created by Dong Bong-su. There were no tombstones, no burial mounds, but it was the resting place of the experience points that had made him the Unnamed Righteous Hero—among them, those who had died more miserably than others.

Corpses burned to death, corpses split in half with their entrails spilling out, corpses torn apart limb from limb, and so on.

The reason he went out of his way to bury them here was simple. It was a mask he had obtained by chance, but one he could take out and put on again at any time, a mask that suited its role. In order to preserve that mask, the name Unnamed Righteous Hero. After all, someone called a righteous hero should not slaughter enemies too cruelly. And so, Dong Bong-su began burying the filthy corpses of the black-clad rogues here. Of course, the very first ones buried here had been Jangho and the ruffians.

Thud-thud.

Another dozen or so corpses were added to the graveyard. These were the fellows he was grateful to who had raised Dong Bong-su’s level from 6 to 7. On the face of the one thrown in last, with only half of its bulky body remaining, a bizarre expression still lingered.

Even now, long after death, it seemed to feel deeply wronged.

That face looked as though it were saying this:

[It’s unfair. Fuck! It’s unfair!]

Dong Bong-su did not know what it found so unfair. To him, such cries were nothing more than empty nonsense.

In Dong Bong-su’s view, this world was extremely fair. The world he had lived in before had been so, and this Murim he lived in now was fair as well.

That the fellow felt it was unfair, even after death, had to be a misunderstanding.

The reason this world was fair was,

Because it was unfair to everyone.

To you, to him, to anyone.

Death was the same.

Death came fairly to everyone. Equally, to all.

The reason the fellow felt it was unfair was probably that that thing called death had come to him a bit earlier. But in the end, death came fairly to everyone.

The world was thus always fair.

That was why he could view the world as fair, and it was the fundamental reason he could ravage the world freely, without a shred of guilt.

Thud, shwaaak, thud, shwaaak.

Soil piled over the faces of the dead. The rhythmic sound of digging once again echoed faintly through the mountains.

One by one, the traces of the Unnamed Righteous Hero’s ‘final act of chivalry’ were erased.

Thud, shwaaak, thud, shwaaak....

With this, the Unnamed Righteous Hero would disappear from the world for quite some time.

● ● ●

Dong Bong-su finished his walk and came down from Bongyang Mountain.

He and Yeoro entered the marketplace, yet no one paid them any attention. He was like a transparent man on these streets. Even if he were to vanish on the spot, not a single person would care.

“They say the Unnamed Righteous Hero finally wiped out even the Black Snake Society yesterday, huh?”

These days, all the people in the marketplace were focused on the Unnamed Righteous Hero. Whenever two or more gathered, anyone would praise the bloody deeds he had carried out so far.

The three gathered by the roadside that Dong Bong-su was passing were no exception.

“Don’t even get me started. The merchants and the courtesans who’d been bled dry by the Black Snake Society are overjoyed, raising a huge fuss.”

“But they say they couldn’t find Bang Po-yeom, the Society Leader? Did he run away?”

Of course, Bang Po-yeom was currently rotting away on Bongyang Mountain, reeking to high heaven.

“Well, who knows. Either he fled and completely left Anhui Province, or he got smashed so badly there’s not even a corpse to find. One of the two.”

At that moment, a man who had been listening to their conversation with a somewhat displeased expression cut in.

“But you know… I’m not so sure about it. Is it really okay for someone calling himself a righteous hero to just kill people so recklessly? No matter how much they’re black-clad rogues, people are still people.”

“Tsk. Just listen to this guy. Think about what those bastards have done to us all this time. They’re the sort who wouldn’t deserve mercy even if they were torn apart alive. People like that deserve to die. I wouldn’t care even if the Unnamed Righteous Hero actually ate them as food.”

“Right, right.”

The two who had been talking from the start even glared at the sullen man as they rushed to defend the Unnamed Righteous Hero.

“Honestly speaking, when have the authorities ever properly cared about ignoramuses like us? And if not them, those so-called orthodox factions strutted around puffing out their chests, when were they ever truly ‘orthodox’? Whether people like us lived or died, weren’t we always outside their concern?”

Under their barrage, the sullen man finally surrendered and nodded in agreement.

“Well… when you put it that way, that’s true. Who would ever step up for bottom-feeders like us?”

“His hand might be a bit heavy, but haven’t people said since ancient times, ‘If it’s evil, then cut it down’?”

“Exactly, exactly.”

And so, in the end, even here the conversation flowed toward praising the chivalrous deeds of the Unnamed Righteous Hero.

Was this what people meant by saying the interpretation outweighed by the dream?

The dream was murder. The interpretation was chivalry.

A world where murder so easily masqueraded as chivalry. In that sense alone, wasn’t this Central Plains truly a beautiful world?

Dong Bong-su continued walking, indifferent to their conversation.

Once he had moved some distance away from the three, the voices of two different people entered his ears.

“Hey, did you hear that?”

“Hear what?”

“They say the second daughter of the Namgung Family is holding her wedding this time.”

“Ah, I heard. That’s why all of Anhui Province has been buzzing lately.”

“Exactly. If nothing else, the sects here in Bongyang must be wracking their brains over what congratulatory gifts to send.”

“No way. When a place like the Namgung Family holds a wedding, they can’t possibly accept gifts from just any random nobodies. The only one really wracking his brain is probably the Danri Family Head.”

“Hmm. Now that you put it that way, you’re probably right. Then what do you think the Danri Family Head will bring as a congratulatory gift?”