Chapter 48 : Inevitable (3)

Grandpa had not woken up. He was just breathing, in a state no different from being dead.

He entrusted Grandpa to a farming couple.

“Please take good care of him.”

“What if he doesn’t wake up?”

“He will wake up.”

“If he dies…?”

“He will not die.”

“Still, a person’s life is sometimes weaker than a fly’s…”

“I will return before he dies.”

Ah Geol had not thought that Grandpa would die.

He would live. He would absolutely live. If the grim reaper came to take him, he would cut down the grim reaper. If the King of Hell dragged him away, he would throw a Single-Instant Blade at the King of Hell.

“You will keep your promise, right?”

“I will definitely keep it.”

“It would be troublesome if you don’t keep it…”

“I will definitely keep it. If it seems I cannot come, I will send someone else to deliver the message.”

“You must keep your promise.”

The farmer’s wife confirmed several times.

He had promised to give six hundred nyang for taking care of Grandpa for a year.

He had not been interested in money because he had only been training in martial arts. When he had emptied out everything he had, six hundred nyang had come out, so he had decided to give six hundred nyang, but there had been no particular calculation.

He had also thought of entrusting Grandpa to a temple or a Taoist monastery. But after much thought, he had chosen the farming couple.

When the fight began, they would dig up his past. Even if it was just a casual acquaintance, they would first take them away, and if the friendship was even a little deep, they would torture them.

Grandpa would be in great danger.

A place like a temple or a Taoist monastery, where many people came and went, was not safe.

‘Grandpa, I have to fight alone. Wake up quickly.’

Ah Geol said his last farewell to Grandpa, who was lying as if he were asleep. It might be the last farewell in this life.

* * *

The Drunken Flower Garden was considered one of the five great flower gardens in the central plains.

The flower garden was the smallest of the five great flower gardens, but the types, shapes, and scents of the flowers were considered the best.

All of that had been done by the hands of the Drunken Flower Garden assassins.

The Drunken Flower Garden assassins, no, the women, could do exactly two things with confidence. One was contract killing, and the other was cultivating flowers.

Flowers and murder.

They were truly words that did not go together, but they existed in the Drunken Flower Garden.

The assassins cultivating flowers was at first a part of their disguise. They had operated a flower garden to hide their identity as assassins.

After the flower garden grew, the flower garden itself became a job.

There was no special meaning of melting the killing intent with flowers, or taking a mental rest. It was simply because it was a job, so they were doing it as well.

This very thing, the thing they could do best, had caught the ankles of the Drunken Flower Garden assassins.

“Did you go to Dongseung?”

Men suddenly rushed in front of a woman. And they started talking nonsense without any reason.

“What are you talking about?”

“Hey. Let’s stop pretending. Why are we like this when we know each other? Did you really not go to Dongseung?”

“Do you know me?”

“No. I don’t. How would I know you? No. I do. A Drunken Flower Garden assassin. Right?”

“You’ve come to the wrong person.”

“Look. We had such a hard time chasing your movements, and you say we’ve come to the wrong person?”

“I really came to the wrong…”

“Alright. Alright. Alright. So, you didn’t go to Dongseung, right? Then what’s the name of the assassin who went to Dongseung and killed Kang Jo? We’re in this mess because we missed that Deceitful Assassin’s record. Just tell me that woman’s name. Then I might let you live.”

“I really don’t know what you’re talking about…”

The woman said with a pale face.

But she could not erase the conviction that the men had.

A strange woman had appeared in a small flower garden. She handled flowers very well. She had no connections in the area. She was a woman from another region, but she handled flowers so well that the owner of the flower garden immediately treated her like a treasure.

This much was no different from confessing, ‘I am a Drunken Flower Garden assassin.’

Sreung! Sreureung!

The men drew their swords.

The woman squeezed her eyes shut. She trembled with fear, as if she were not a Drunken Flower Garden assassin even if she died.

Was she really not a Drunken Flower Garden assassin?

“Look, you’ll really die if you do that. You have to at least resist. Otherwise, you’ll really die.”

“I, I really don’t know what you’re talking about. A Drunken Flower Garden assassin? I’ve never killed anyone.”

“What’s that callus on your palm?”

“What?”

“It’s a mark of holding a sword, right? Haha! Deceive someone you can deceive. Is it right for people who eat the same rice to be like this?”

The men smiled smoothly.

As the men had said, the woman’s right hand had hard calluses. The calluses were not on the entire palm. They were firmly in place in specific areas, such as the part where you hold a sword, the fingers, or the lower part of the palm.

“This is from hoeing…”

“Alright. Then you keep hoeing. We’ll do the blade work. Then it’s settled, right? Let’s just do what we were doing.”

The men readjusted their grip on their swords. At that moment,

Shwaek! Peok! Peok!

“Kuaak!”

The sound of something cutting through the air and a scream burst out at the same time.

“G-Garden Master!”

A gleam of light flashed in the eyes of the woman who had been pleading that she was a Drunken Flower Garden assassin until just a moment ago.

“The tail has been caught. All of them.”

“What?”

“Do you know where the other kids are?”

“I don’t know.”

The Drunken Flower Garden assassin shook her head.

Of course, she didn’t know. They had scattered in all directions after the first base.

They had melted into the world.

Naturally, no one should know. If a Drunken Flower Garden assassin didn’t know the whereabouts of her colleagues, who could?

But these people were finding them.

They were finding them one by one and killing them all. They would kill them even if they resisted, and they would kill them even if they denied it. There was no mercy.

Among them, there would be cases where they had mistakenly identified a person.

Even if they were not a Drunken Flower Garden assassin, if they were mistaken for an assassin and killed, this point was not considered at all. If they were marked as a ‘Drunken Flower Garden assassin’, they would kill them without hesitation.

There was no law, no justice, no ethics. They only had an absolute authority. They had the thought that they could do whatever they wanted, whether it was murder or something else.

Dangerous! Against such people, the Drunken Flower Garden assassins would be swept away like fallen leaves in the autumn wind.

“You follow me.”

“Yes.”

The eyes of the woman who had been cultivating the flowers turned sharp.

Although she was a seventy-year-old woman, she wore fine clothes like a middle-aged woman. She dyed her hair so that it had a black sheen, and she put on makeup every morning without fail.

It was the Seventh Elder’s habit.

The Seventh Elder also liked showy flowers. She cultivated flowers like roses or zinnias.

Swoosh!

Young men blocked her path.

“What is it?”

“The person who will kill you.”

“Hoo! Then you have to kill. Kill.”

Chwaak!

The Seventh Elder took out her chain whip.

The fact that the Drunken Flower Garden had disbanded meant that they had done something dangerous enough to disband. Moreover, she had also heard that the prison had collapsed before they had disbanded. Naturally, there were pursuers.

So, she had chosen to scatter, but the elders were not included in that.

The nine elders of the Drunken Flower Garden were already widely known in the central plains.

If someone wanted to kill the elders, they would chase them even if they fled to the ends of the central plains.

So, she had been prepared for death from the moment the disbandment order was given.

But they had come too quickly. She had thought they would come after at least a month or two.

“If you just tell me one thing, I might go back.”

“Let’s just fight. Looking at the way you’re asking, it seems you won’t be able to tell me even if you hear it.”

“It’s simple. The assassin who went to Dongseung and killed Kang Jo, who is it?”

‘Mongseol!’

“Dongseung? Kang Jo? I don’t know what you’re talking about. Are you senile even though you’re not old? This is a big problem.”

“Hahaha!”

The men laughed.

The fight was unavoidable anyway. They had come knowing that she was a Drunken Flower Garden assassin, and if they were asking about the Dongseung Kang Jo incident, she could not deny it.

‘Four people. They’re not executing a formation… they’re lives that have bet their lives on the blade. Wild dogs.’

Who among martial artists did not bet their lives on the blade?

The focus of their blades was on murder. They excluded all forms and pursued only murder. So, you should not expect a fair fight.

Swish! Swish!

The four moved.

They drove the Seventh Elder into the middle, and they occupied the four directions.

Shwaaaek! Chwaak!

The Seventh Elder raised her chain whip and swept the four directions with the Eight Directions Wind and Rain.

She had no intention of hitting the men. It was a threat not to enter the chain whip’s range. At that moment,

Shwaek!

A man from behind quickly approached.

He aimed for the moment the chain whip spun and struck the ground. He quickly aimed for her back and attacked.

The Seventh Elder quickly struck back with her chain whip.

Shwaaaek! Jwaaak!

The chain whip flew, aiming for the one who was approaching from behind. But this time, the one in front attacked.

Shwaek! Shwaek!

The Seventh Elder diligently swung her chain whip.

They did not finish their attacks. If they were attacking and the chain whip was swung, they would quickly retreat. They would never clash. Instead, the one who saw the Seventh Elder’s back would rush in without mercy.

A fair fight was out of the question. They only aimed for her back.

“Hoot!”

The Seventh Elder let out a rough breath.

The result of such a fight was already decided. You could not handle ten hands with one palm. Even if it was an opponent you could win against in a one-on-one fight, you couldn’t do anything if they rushed in like this.

‘They know my martial arts!’

The men had thoroughly analyzed the whip art. They knew how to effectively catch the Seventh Elder.

“Don’t you think it’s cowardly?”

The Seventh Elder said.

It was a useless thing to say. If they were the type to care about such words, they would not have become wild dogs.

Whirik!

One of them aimed for her back and rushed in.

The Seventh Elder used a movement technique to dodge. She turned around and glared at the opponent.

Then the one who had seen her back again rushed in. The sword wind he swung raged fiercely.

The Seventh Elder turned around again.

The one who had been rushing towards her quickly retreated. And without fail, the one who had seen her back rushed in.

Shwaaaek!

She swung her chain whip roughly and pushed all four of them far away.

They were pushed back. They did not hurry. They believed that time would solve everything.

“Hoop!”

She took a deep breath and thought about how she should fight.

There was no way. There had to be a way to strike all four of them at once, but there was none. Then she had to have the speed to snatch the one who was rushing in, aiming for her back, but she didn’t have that either.

You couldn’t catch a retreating person with the same speed.

‘What a bad day.’

The Seventh Elder let out a smirk and readjusted her grip on her chain whip. At that moment,

Shwaaaek!

“Kuk!”

The sound of something cutting through the air burst out, and one of the men collapsed.

The blade that had pierced the man’s back protruded from his chest.

“You!”

The Seventh Elder’s eyes widened.

“There’s no time. The other elders are also being attacked!”

The woman, Mongseol, finished her words and immediately shot towards another man.

Flash!

A flash of light flashed in the air.

For a moment, the blade she swung looked red. It looked like a blood sword because she had pulled it out with the man’s blood on it.

A blood-colored blood sword is pulled out. A man collapses.

“B-Blood Sword! Blood Sea Sword Saint!”

The Seventh Elder muttered without realizing it.