Chapter 2

Chapter 2: The Waiter Hides His Magic (2)

Isn't this a disaster?

Face drained pale, Ha Jin mumbled in a daze.

He had just begun adapting to life in the Central Plains, dreaming of small happinesses—and now those plans had shattered to pieces in an instant.

At this rate, forget running an inn—he'd be branded a public enemy of the martial world and dragged away for certain.

Above all, the moment he killed a disciple of a prestigious orthodox sect, being hunted by the Kunlun Sect became unavoidable.

The moment they caught him, they'd probably sever his meridians and destroy his qi center, wouldn't they?

'Damn it, am I a murderer now......?'

And what about that shout from the old man earlier? What the hell had happened?

It was while Ha Jin still couldn't shake his bewilderment.

A group of black-masked figures burst into the inn.

"Everyone! Protect the elder!"

They cut down the remaining Kunlun Sect warriors in the blink of an eye and quietly surveyed the scene.

Like the warriors before them, they appeared to be searching for something.

Ha Jin barely had time to process the bewildering scene before one of the masked figures approached him and asked.

"Are you, by any chance, Elder Yu Jin-bang's disciple?"

Ha Jin looked at the masked figure who was staring at him with trembling eyes.

'What's this one going on about now?'

At the question of whether he was Elder Yu Jin-bang's disciple, Ha Jin quickly turned the gears in his head.

The old man had never explicitly called him a disciple.

But he had cherished Ha Jin as his good-luck charm, and Ha Jin had learned the inn's work and even cooking from him.

Above all, Yu Jin-bang was the only person who had extended a hand to him in this strange land, and it was through his teachings that Ha Jin's dream had taken shape.

'Well, broadly speaking, calling myself his disciple wouldn't exactly be wrong.'

After a moment's deliberation, Ha Jin slowly nodded.

What happened next was astonishing. The masked figure before him suddenly began to tremble, as if overwhelmed by emotions he could no longer contain. Even through the mask, it was plain to see his eyes growing moist.

"Ahhh......! We believed the elder had abandoned his purpose, yet here he was raising a disciple all along! He never forsook his loyalty to the Sect after all!"

The masked figure cried out, nearly in tears, and from the other masked figures behind him rose low gasps and murmurs brimming with emotion. A few looked ready to drop to their knees in sheer exaltation.

Ha Jin stared at them with a bewildered expression.

'What's wrong with these people? Are they manic or something?'

He muttered inwardly. He simply couldn't make sense of the situation.

'Yu Jin-bang was a kind man, sure, but what is this? Was he some legendary Grand Master Chef in a past life? His cooking wasn't that remarkable, though......?'

If it had been, the inn would have been thriving long ago.

Ha Jin's mind was in utter chaos. The inn floor splattered with a Kunlun Sect disciple's blood, and then these masked figures who had appeared out of nowhere, weeping with joy at the idea that he was Elder Yu Jin-bang's disciple.

He couldn't figure out which beat to dance to.

Just then, the masked figure who appeared to be the leader stepped forward and offered a respectful clasped hands greeting.

"We have been remiss in showing proper respect to the disciple of Elder Ghost Hand! I am Yang Jun, Captain of the Protector Squad of the Heavenly Demon Divine Sect! It is an honor to meet the elder's disciple!"

Yang Jun's declaration echoed through the inn. Ha Jin's brow furrowed.

'Wait, what now? The Heavenly Demon Divine Sect?'

Ha Jin was inwardly aghast. The Heavenly Demon Divine Sect—in other words, the Demonic Sect. Those people who killed on a whim, ate corpses, and drank blood. Ah, was that the Blood Sect?

In any case, wasn't that the colossal force that commonly appeared as the axis of evil or the public enemy in martial arts novels?

'And what? Ghost Hand's disciple? Don't tell me old man Yu Jin-bang is the one they call Ghost Hand?'

In that instant, the memory of the Kunlun Sect warriors shouting about his connection to Ghost Hand flashed through his mind. At the time, he had dismissed it as nonsense, but hearing the masked figures' words, it finally made sense. In other words, he had been mistaken for a Demonic Sect member's disciple.

'Wait, that kind-looking old man was a Demonic Sect member?'

Ha Jin did his best to compose his expression and carefully addressed Yang Jun.

"Um......Captain Yang? I believe there's been a considerable misunderstanding. I'm nothing more than an ordinary waiter who works at this inn......"

But the words never made it past his throat. Mid-sentence, his gaze drifted to the floor, where he saw Baek Hak's bisected corpse sprawled across it.

'Ha.......'

Ha Jin let out a deep sigh inwardly.

'Claiming to be ordinary while a corpse I cut in half is lying right there on the floor—yeah, fat chance anyone's buying that.'

Insisting he was just an ordinary waiter held absolutely no persuasive power in the current situation. So Ha Jin decided to try clearing up the misunderstanding through a different approach. To do that, he needed to assess the situation first.

"Captain Yang? Would you happen to know what level of mastery the man called Baek Hak had reached?"

"Baek Hak was a promising First Disciple even within the Kunlun Sect—a master who had attained the first-rate level. He possessed considerable skill despite his youth."

He had felled a first-rate master in a single blow. Until now, Ha Jin had never been able to gauge where his magic stood in terms of this world's martial arts. He'd had little reason to fight at full strength, and his limited mana had restricted which spells he could use.

All he had recognized was that his current state was clearly different from when he'd been called a "genius Mage" back in the modern world.

He'd had no sense of how powerful his magic actually was or where it stood compared to the martial arts of this world—but apparently, it was at least enough to dispatch an off-guard first-rate master.

'So should I just say I got lucky?'

It was then that Yang Jun suddenly looked at Ha Jin with gleaming eyes.

"Come to think of it, you faced Baek Hak—a first-rate master—and came away without so much as a scratch! Truly, as expected of Elder Ghost Hand's disciple, you've been concealing tremendous skill! Did the elder perhaps pass down a special secret technique to you?"

"Pardon......?"

Yang Jun's voice was laced with reverence. Seeing this, Ha Jin despaired inwardly.

'He won't believe me no matter what I say.'

He realized that no matter what he said, it would inevitably circle back to him being not the disciple of the cook Yu Jin-bang, but the disciple of the elder known as Ghost Hand. On top of that, he had a gut feeling that his future had become thoroughly tangled.

'I've killed a Kunlun Sect disciple AND I'm being called a Demonic Sect member's disciple? I'm done for in the martial world.'

Just as the thought that his future had been cut short in an instant sent his vision swimming, Yang Jun's face came into view again. Come to think of it, he'd said the Heavenly Demon Divine Sect, hadn't he?

'Don't places like the Demonic Sect take in runaways pretty readily? Like people seeking asylum in history books. Then maybe going to the Demonic Sect would actually be the better move......?'

Since he'd already killed a Kunlun Sect disciple, it was essentially the same as having completely turned his back on the orthodox sects.

For someone like him—without a single acquaintance in this world—a massive organization like the Demonic Sect might actually serve as a reliable backer.

Figuring he had nothing to lose, Ha Jin asked Yang Jun once more.

"......Well, something like that. More importantly—you're saying you people are members of the Heavenly Demon Divine Sect?"

"That is correct. The Heavenly Demon Returns! All Demons Bow in Reverence!"

Ugh, a bunch of damn zealots. Ha Jin swallowed briefly, then asked the question that had been burning inside him most.

"If I were to go there, could I set up a shop like this inn and live......no, wait. Are there villages where people actually gather and live there?"

Just opening a shop would be meaningless on its own. To do business, after all, one needed a commercial district.

"Of course. Near the Hundred Thousand Mountains, there is a village called Black Wood Cliff. Countless commoners who fled persecution in the Central Plains gathered there to form a settlement, and it has grown quite prosperous by now."

"Oh?"

From the way he described it, the scale sounded fairly substantial. Ha Jin made up his mind.

"Then would it be possible for me to come along to the Heavenly Demon Divine Sect?"

At Ha Jin's question, color returned to Yang Jun's face.

"Of course! If you are Elder Ghost Hand's disciple, we welcome you with open arms! In fact, the reason we came all the way to Xining was to escort the elder to Black Wood Cliff."

"......Wait! Speaking of—the elder!"

Ha Jin hurried back inside the inn, toward where Yu Jin-bang's scream had come from.

Please let that scream have belonged to someone else. And please let Yu Jin-bang have escaped through the back door, which was why his voice had gone silent.

But in the kitchen lay Yu Jin-bang, eyes still open, cold and lifeless. His body was riddled with blade wounds, as if to prove the fight had been savage.

And beside him, the corpses of the warriors who had earlier charged into the kitchen were piled high. They were said to have been Kunlun's Elders, yet they had been brutally slaughtered. To have done this to men who were clearly formidable masters, all by himself?

"Elder!!!"

Ha Jin rushed to check Yu Jin-bang's condition. But there was no response—his breath had already ceased.

The masked figure, too, seemed startled by the sight, his eyes widening briefly before he wiped away tears. After sniffling for a good while, he spoke to Ha Jin.

"Damn it. We arrived too late. We should have escorted the elder to Black Wood Cliff! Regrettable as it is, the best we can do now is recover the body. We need to report the matter with Kunlun to the Sect at once."

Then, another masked figure who had stormed the inn alongside Yang Jun entered the kitchen. After surveying the scene, he spoke with a pained expression.

"He was not a man who should have fallen to rabble like this. If only he hadn't destroyed his own qi center to swear loyalty to the Sect Leader before leaving...... If at the very least his arm had been whole......"

"You! That is slander against the Sect Leader!"

Yang Jun rebuked him, but he himself wore a look of unrelenting frustration.

Ha Jin stood in silence for a moment, looking down at Yu Jin-bang's final form. This was the man who had shown warmth for the first time to someone stranded alone in a foreign world, and who had given him the means to survive.

Without him, Ha Jin's life would have already been over. He offered a silent prayer in his heart.

-Running a peaceful little inn was my humble dream.

The words Yu Jin-bang had always murmured lingered in his ears.

'Thanks to you, sir, I was able to safely find my footing in this strange land. It was only a short time, but I am truly grateful for the kindness you showed me. Your dream—I will carry it on without fail.'

He quietly closed Yu Jin-bang's eyes and stood up. He felt it clearly now—his ties to this inn, and to Xining, had truly come to an end.

"Let's go. To the Heavenly Demon Divine Sect."

***

A short while later. Ha Jin stepped out of the inn carrying a single pack on his back.

"Let us depart."

Yang Jun gave his modest belongings a once-over and asked.

"Is that all your luggage?"

"Yes, that's all."

At Ha Jin's brief answer, Yang Jun asked nothing further and nodded as he headed outside. A rather sturdy-looking carriage stood parked in front of the inn.

"It's quite a distance to Xinjiang, where the Sect is located."

The moment he boarded the carriage, a jolting vibration ran through it. Ha Jin gazed out the window at the Kunlun Inn and the scenery of Xining rapidly fading into the distance.

'I'm really going to the Heavenly Demon Divine Sect.'

It was a path he had chosen himself, yet it still didn't feel real. From Hunter, to inn waiter, and now heading for the Demonic Sect's stronghold. Life truly was unpredictable.

Just then, Yang Jun, who was seated across from him, cautiously spoke up.

"Come to think of it, it seems you hardly heard anything about the Divine Sect from the elder?"

Ha Jin nodded. He genuinely didn't know. He hadn't known Yu Jin-bang was a Demonic Sect member, let alone that the man was the apparently legendary figure called Ghost Hand.

"No, I didn't hear the details."

"Then allow me to explain at least the broad strokes while we travel to the Divine Sect. It would be better to know before you arrive."

"That would be appreciated."

Ha Jin agreed without resistance.

The information he vaguely knew about the Heavenly Demon Divine Sect from martial arts novels was overwhelmingly biased and negative—the orthodox sects' sworn enemy, a group that plunged the Central Plains into chaos, and so on.

Naturally, none of that was of much use right now.

Yang Jun took a moment to steady his breathing, then began to speak in a calm voice. And from the very first words, Ha Jin was struck speechless.

"Though the Divine Sect does use the character 'Demon' in its name, it is not a place that prizes wickedness in the way most people commonly assume."

The Demonic Sect isn't evil......? Then what in the world is it?