The Former Supreme Master [Novel] Chapter 22

Cheon Yangho drank in silence at a tavern. A man entered and seated himself across the table.

“What brings you here without prior notice?”

The man was Gwak, the Branch Manager of the Zhejiang Division’s Pogang Branch. Cheon Yangho had personally sought him out.

“I dropped by to see an old face, among other things.”

“How many years has it been?”

“About two.”

“Time flies.”

The two shared a history, having joined the Murim Alliance in the same cohort.

In truth, Gwak harbored little affection for Cheon Yangho. The man belonged to a breed that willingly cannibalized others to gorge on personal profit. His reputation among their peers lay in the gutter.

Yet, Gwak wore a smile before him. The reason was as wretched as it was simple: Cheon Yangho held power. Whispers openly crowned him the true authority of the Division. Offending him would invite a plague of troubles upon the Pogang Branch. Among their cohort, Cheon Yangho was treated like filth—something avoided not out of fear, but pure disgust.

“You aren’t the type to wander over without a purpose. Speak. What do you need?”

“I have a question.”

“Ask.”

“Back when you served at the Main Headquarters, you were in the White Dragon Corps, weren’t you?”

“I was.”

Gwak had once basked in prestige at the Main Headquarters. However, a catastrophic blunder during an operation had earned him banishment to this desolate branch.

“Then you must be well-acquainted with the Iron Sword Corps.”

“Enough to get by.”

“Have you ever heard the name Baek Socheon?”

Gwak flinched. The sheer weight of that name instantly obliterated his cynical thought of, ‘I knew this bastard didn’t just come to see me.’

“Why bring him up?”

“So you do know him.”

“I asked, why bring him up?”

“You caught wind of the incident at the Munseong Branch, didn’t you?”

“The Yangchu massacre? Heard some lunatic butchered the entire family.”

“Right. I went down to investigate, and Baek Socheon was there. He carried a peculiar aura. It piqued my interest.”

“He was a rising star in the Iron Sword Corps. His martial prowess was peerless.”

Gwak resolved to sever the information right there. In truth, he knew the depths of Baek Socheon’s history. He knew the man had not only commanded the Iron Sword Corps but had ascended to the throne of the Secret Pavilion before facing a brutal demotion.

Yet, a strict gag order bound any whisper regarding Baek Socheon. Spilling secrets tethered to the Secret Pavilion invited a gruesome demise. Gwak still clung to a fragile thread of hope to return to the Main Headquarters; he would not sever it with his own tongue.

Had he shared a shred of camaraderie with Cheon Yangho—if they were even pleasant acquaintances—he might have shared the truth and warned him to sew his lips shut. But for Cheon Yangho, this shallow scrap of lore was more than enough.

“But how did a man like that end up rotting in the Munseong Branch?”

“His body was crippled. He can no longer wield internal energy.”

“He lacks internal energy?”

“Exactly.”

Doubt coiled in Cheon Yangho’s mind. Heuksu falling to a cripple devoid of internal energy defied all logic.

“Was his martial prowess truly that terrifying?”

“It was. He possessed strength far surpassing a mere Squad Leader.”

Gwak sidestepped the specifics, weaving a veil of words that was neither truth nor lie.

“My thanks. Let us meet again.”

Cheon Yangho rose and departed.

Gwak scoffed as the man vanished the moment he extracted what he needed. A cold satisfaction bloomed in his chest—he had made the right choice in hiding the truth. The bastard hadn’t even paid for the liquor he drank. Should a man not buy a round after stripping another of information?

‘An arrogant wretch to the bone.’

Whatever reason drove him to dig into Baek Socheon’s past, Gwak offered a silent, venomous prayer.

‘May Warrior Baek grind you into dust!’

That was his most sincere desire.

Naturally, Gwak remained blind to the truth. Cheon Yangho was entangled with Baek Socheon far deeper than he could ever fathom. If he had known, he would never have begrudged paying the tavern bill that day.

***

Heuksu never surfaced.

They scoured the darkest alleys, hoping to find him drowning in liquor and tangled with a harlot, but their search yielded nothing.

Wang Gon prayed that Heuksu had fled, unable to stomach the sheer humiliation of his defeat. If he had run, it meant no monstrous adversary lurked in the shadows, waiting to claim his life.

Yet, reality mercilessly shredded that hollow hope. The dread he had shoved to the back of his mind was solidifying into a grim truth.

“Baek Socheon undoubtedly slaughtered him.”

He should have realized it the moment a Squad Leader of the Iron Sword Corps was exiled to this barren frontier. The man belonged to the same breed as him. A predator who slaughtered without hesitation and erased the bloodstains without a trace.

Two paths lay before him to handle this threat.
Bribe him into submission, or erase him from the world.

If he dragged his feet, the Gang Leader would catch wind of his colossal failure. Before that happened, he had to sever this tangled knot and prove he still gripped the reins of control.

A subordinate interrupted his racing thoughts.

“Cheon Yangho requests an audience.”

This encounter would dictate which of the two paths he would walk.

***

A solitary carriage sat parked in the dense woods bordering the Munseong Branch.
The same carriage Wang Woo had occupied days ago now housed Wang Gon.

Scanning the shadows for pursuit, Cheon Yangho cautiously emerged and climbed aboard. Wang Gon dispensed with pleasantries, diving straight for the throat.

“Did you unearth any trace of Heuksu within the Branch?”

“No. Nothing.”

“Baek Socheon’s blade is the most likely culprit.”

“I dug into his past through my own channels.”

Cheon Yangho relayed everything Gwak had fed him.

“A rising star in the Iron Sword Corps?”

“Yes. He wasn’t a mere Squad Leader; his martial prowess was peerless. Though his dantian is shattered and he lacks internal energy, he remains a master more than capable of butchering Heuksu.”

A cold chill crawled up Wang Gon’s spine. To exude such terrifying martial might with a shattered dantian meant the man had once stood at the absolute zenith of power.

“A terrifying feat for a mere youth.”

“He is no youth. The man is thirty-eight.”

“What?”

Wang Gon gaped. Thirty-eight meant he had waded through an ocean of blood and weathered countless storms.

“Damn it.”

The relaxed, mocking demeanor he displayed while pummeling him and Heuksu suddenly made perfect, terrifying sense.

‘I kicked the sleeping tiger.’

And that was merely the vanguard of his problems.

‘If this monster digs into the massacre alongside Lim Chung, my head will roll.’

Reading the mounting dread in Wang Gon’s eyes, Cheon Yangho treaded carefully.

“I will dig deeper into his roots. Given the peering eyes, it would be wise to sever contact for the time being.”

Wang Gon immediately sensed the rat trying to abandon a sinking ship.

‘You fool. You cannot wash the blood off your hands so easily.’

The moment he swallowed that first bribe, the exit had sealed shut. The harder he thrashed, the deeper the snare would bite into his flesh. Wang Gon had zero intention of releasing his hound.

“I need your blade to erase him.”

Shock slammed into Cheon Yangho. Suggesting they sever contact was merely bait to test Wang Gon’s desperation. Never in his wildest dreams did he expect a blunt, naked command to assassinate Baek Socheon.

Between bribery and slaughter, Wang Gon chose slaughter.

Leaving a rabid wolf alive would only invite a slit throat in the night. The throbbing agony in his battered face and the infuriating void left by Heuksu’s demise poured oil on his murderous intent.

“I cannot do that.”

“You can, and you will.”

Wang Gon drew a heavy envelope from his robes and tossed it over.

Inside lay Central Plains Bank notes, each bearing the staggering denomination of one thousand taels. Ten notes in total. A sum that dwarfed his usual bribes.

Ten thousand taels.

A Unit Captain earned a meager eleven hundred taels a year. By severing a single life, he could gorge on nine years’ worth of grueling labor.

Ten thousand taels. It was a demonic temptation, impossible to bat away.

Staring down at the envelope, the gears in Cheon Yangho’s mind spun with frenzied greed.

‘This miser is throwing ten thousand taels? Why reek of such desperation?’

Because he got beaten? Because he believes Heuksu perished by his hands? No, neither warranted bleeding such a vast fortune. Then, a chilling realization pierced his thoughts.

‘I knew it! They orchestrated the Yangchu massacre.’

Wang Woo’s earlier reaction had planted the seed of suspicion, but now it bloomed into a grim certainty. Cheon Yangho knew he had to bury this revelation deep within his soul. If Wang Gon sensed he knew the truth, he would be the next corpse buried in the woods.

“It is a vast fortune, undeniably… but I eat the rice of the Murim Alliance. I cannot butcher my own colleague. Furthermore, the man is a monster who slaughtered Heuksu.”

He had never crossed blades with Heuksu, but he knew the man stood a realm above him in martial prowess.

“Even so, if you set your mind to it, you possess the means, don’t you?”

“That is…”

Cheon Yangho trailed off, probing for a reaction. Yet, the words that spilled from Wang Gon’s lips shattered his expectations.

“Deliver his corpse, and I will hand you another ten thousand taels.”

“……!”

“Do not let greed blind you. My patience is already frayed to a bleeding thread.”

Cheon Yangho dared not push for more. A single, blazing thought consumed his mind.

‘Twenty thousand taels!’

A fortune demanding nearly twenty years of bone-grinding servitude. A sum possessing the absolute power to rewrite his destiny.

“How you sever his life is your concern. Do not drag your feet; erase him immediately. Will you take the blood contract? Or will you turn your back on twenty thousand taels?”

The scales in Cheon Yangho’s heart had long plummeted to one side. No morality or fear could counterbalance the sheer, crushing weight of twenty thousand taels. The only question left was how to butcher his prey.

“I accept.”

“Excellent.”

Wang Gon thrust the envelope into Cheon Yangho’s hands. Tucking the silver into his robes, Cheon Yangho spoke.

“The moment his corpse drops, the Division will dispatch hounds to investigate. If the case lands in my lap, we breathe easy. If they unleash another investigator, their fangs might point toward you.”

“Undoubtedly.”

“When that happens, use the vanished Heuksu as your shield.”

“You mean pin the slaughter on him?”

“The man’s pride in his martial arts pierced the heavens, did it not? Frame it as a rogue vendetta. Claim he butchered the man and vanished into the night.”

Disguising his selfish plotting as loyalty, Cheon Yangho flawlessly dug his own escape tunnel.

“A brilliant scheme.”

Even if Heuksu’s rotting corpse surfaced later, it mattered little. By then, he would have uprooted everything and vanished.

***

The moment Cheon Yangho vanished into the shadows, Wang Woo slipped from the driver’s seat into the cabin.

“Father, is twenty thousand taels not too vast a fortune to spill?”

Furthermore, this silver did not bleed from the Divine Fire Gang’s coffers; it was their personal vault. It was the very inheritance destined to fall into Wang Woo’s hands.

Inheriting his father’s throne was Wang Woo’s sole ambition. He hungered for nothing more. Ruling Munseong like a king, just as his father did, required overflowing coffers. He could not sit idle while his vault was plundered.

“It is a vast fortune. Yet, a beast of his caliber demands a heavy chunk of meat to bare his fangs.”

“Even so… twenty thousand taels.”

“Banish your regret. That twenty thousand taels will forge eternal shackles, binding him as our loyal hound for the rest of his pathetic life.”

Wang Gon had already savored the intoxicating nectar of absolute power. To taste an even sweeter, more volatile supremacy, he would claw his way to the heavens. If it demanded draining his entire fortune to pave the path, he would do it without blinking.

“Power breeds silver. As long as your fists possess the authority to crush throats, the silver will flow endlessly. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

Wang Woo’s reply reeked of reluctance. His tongue had tasted the raw allure of silver long before he understood the true weight of power. And a shallow taste at that.

‘…Even so, wasting twenty thousand taels burns my stomach. With that much silver, I could feast and revel in the Hundred Flowers Pavilion for an entire year…’

***

Cheon Yangho did not delay the slaughter.
Waiting for tomorrow would not conjure unseen opportunities, nor would it strip his prey of strength.

Erasing his presence, Cheon Yangho crept toward Baek Socheon’s quarters like a phantom in the night. Twenty thousand taels was a temptation no mortal could deny.

Yet, two more pillars supported his murderous resolve.
First, the undeniable truth that his prey lacked internal energy. No matter how peerless one’s martial skill, a warrior devoid of internal energy was nothing but a hollow husk.

The final pillar rested in the small, cylindrical hidden weapon resting coldly in his palm.
The Ten-Step Life-Severing Needle.

The toxin coating the needles was a lethal poison, and within a radius of ten steps, it was fabled to never miss its mark. Because of its terrifying lethality, the Murim Alliance branded it a Forbidden Hidden Weapon, despite it being a single-use artifact. Merely possessing it constituted a grave crime, guaranteeing a one-way trip to the underground dungeon.

Ever since he chanced upon this cursed artifact, Cheon Yangho had kept it buried deep in the shadows, waiting for the singular moment to alter his destiny.

That moment had descended tonight, cloaked in twenty thousand taels!

A faint rustle echoed from the courtyard. Judging by the rhythm, his prey was steeped in martial training.

‘Even better.’

A mind drowned in training offered the perfect opening for an ambush. Conversely, devoid of internal energy, his prey possessed absolutely no capacity to sense an assassin lurking beyond ten steps.

Beneath the pale moonlight, Baek Socheon brutalized his physical vessel.
He balanced upside down, performing push-ups on a single finger. After completing a set, he smoothly swapped fingers and continued the grueling cycle.

The sheer, hellish intensity of his regimen defied logic—how could flesh and bone endure such agony without a shred of internal energy? Sweat poured from him like a torrential rain.

While a mortal pushed his endurance to conquer agonizing limits, Cheon Yangho offered no applause. Instead, he coldly raised the hidden weapon.

Utterly blind to the fact that his wretched life choices had cost him vital, lifesaving intelligence from his peer, Cheon Yangho aimed the Ten-Step Life-Severing Needle at Baek Socheon, hidden within an abyss as black as his own soul.