Chapter 44
The first thing I felt when I opened my eyes was one thing.
‘The smell of something burning?’
There was a burnt smell at the tip of my nose.
I had been lying on the bed, staring blankly at the ceiling, when I suddenly sat upright.
Something was wrong. The surroundings were strangely bright. Someone might have thought it was because morning had come, but the sky visible through the gaps in the window was still completely dark.
Then where was this light coming from? It was as if someone had lit a fire beside me, or perhaps set something on fire…
“……!”
At the thought that suddenly occurred to me, I hurriedly climbed down from the bed. I put on my shoes and ran to open the door…
“What… what is this?”
Fire.
It was fire.
Everything around me was burning.
The burnt smell I had noticed while half-asleep had come from this. The buildings that had been perfectly fine just yesterday were being consumed by the flames and collapsing, while the clean floors had been reduced to a mess of debris and soot.
And several people were lying collapsed on top of it. People whose bodies were drenched in blood…
Blood?
“Uh, uh?”
I sucked in a breath. Then I ran toward the people lying on the ground. They had deep wounds all over their bodies, and here and there I could even see people whose bodies had been mutilated.
But if there was one thing they all had in common, it was that none of them moved at all. No matter how loudly I shouted for them or shook their bodies, it was the same.
Instead, the pools of blood gathering on the floor only continued to spread. At last, I realized.
‘They’re dead.’
They were all dead.
They were already dead.
All of them, in a single night.
‘Why?’
Just as a scream was about to burst out of me…
“Hey!”
At the sudden shout, I snapped my head up. A familiar figure was running toward me from far away. An inexplicable sense of relief washed over me, and I shouted loudly.
“Uncle Hwang!”
Uncle Hwang reached me in no time. I grabbed his collar and babbled.
“U-Uncle, what happened? I mean, I heard screaming in my sleep, and when I came outside, there was a fire, no, there were people lying around, and there’s blood over there, blood…”
“Kid.”
Uncle Hwang grabbed my shoulders.
“I understand that you’re confused. But there’s no time to calmly explain things right now. We have to go. Follow me, right now.”
“What? Where…?”
“Quick!”
With that, he grabbed my arm and started running.
I followed Uncle Hwang almost instinctively as he ran. Countless questions arose in my mind. But I couldn’t bring myself to voice them.
Because a scene straight out of hell had unfolded before my eyes.
“Run, run away…!”
“Ahh, my leg! Someone, please help me!”
“Please save me! Please, aahhh!”
The inner courtyard was nothing short of chaos.
With flames blazing in every direction, countless people were tangled together in disarray. Half of them were already collapsed on the ground, while those who remained were running around in confusion and terror.
Screams filled with fear, cries of despair, sobbing… Amid the chaos, I heard someone shout.
“It’s the Demonic Cult! The Demonic Cult is going to kill us all!”
‘The Demonic Cult?’
The familiar word immediately snapped me to attention.
I remembered what Aso had told me before.
She had said that the atmosphere had been unsettling lately. Martial artists were coming and going in the usually quiet Bakrahyeon, and in some places, the Demonic Cult had appeared and was indiscriminately killing and abducting people.
She had told me to be careful too, just in case. I had said I understood at the time, but in truth, I hadn’t taken it seriously.
The Demonic Cult usually appeared in populous provincial capitals, and more importantly, in <The Lord of Heavenly Pillars>, Xiao Yanli never became involved with the Demonic Cult.
Xiao Yanli died solely because of her ‘illness.’ Until then, she had lived peacefully without ever becoming involved with the Demonic Cult. The Xiao Estate itself had also existed perfectly normally before the protagonist arrived.
Perhaps that was why I had felt even more reassured. That the still-young young lady wouldn’t be swept up in the storms of the martial world…
‘Really?’
But then why had this happened?
Why was the Demonic Cult here…? Then the young lady…
‘The young lady?’
At the thought of that white face that suddenly came to mind, I shouted.
“Uncle, wait, wait a second!”
“I’ll tell you later!”
“What about the young lady? Is the young lady safe? She’s all right, isn’t she? Where is the young lady now…!”
But I couldn’t finish my sentence. Someone blocked our path.
“……!”
Uncle Hwang and I stopped in our tracks.
I had a bad feeling.
It wasn’t simply because the person blocking our path was a man wearing a black mask. It was because blood was dripping from the long sword in his hand… from the blade, sharpened to a vivid blue sheen.
I felt like I knew whose blood it was without anyone having to tell me. Uncle Hwang seemed to feel it too, because he stepped backward and came closer to me.
“Uncle…”
“Kid.”
Uncle Hwang suddenly whispered.
“Go to the ancestral hall.”
“…….”
“Everyone should be gathered there. I’ll hold him off somehow, so run while you have the chance. You’re small, so if you hide among the people, they’ll have a hard time finding you.”
“…….”
“Now, I’ll count, so as soon as I…”
“B-but what about you, Uncle?”
At the sound of my trembling voice, Uncle Hwang finally turned around.
Unlike what I had expected… that he would be just as frightened as I was, Uncle Hwang looked calm. No, rather, he smiled proudly as he always did and said,
“You think I’m going to die here?”
“…….”
“No way. No, absolutely not. I still have plenty of things I want to do. I haven’t saved much money, I haven’t even opened a shop under my own name, and most importantly, I haven’t even gotten myself a wife yet.”
“…….”
“I shouldn’t have turned down that offer when Mr. Pyo said he’d introduce me to a decent young woman… Tsk, though I do wonder who’d ever want to marry this old bachelor.”
Uncle Hwang met my eyes and grinned.
“You’ve got to be there beside me when I get married and congratulate me, too. Huh? Don’t tell me you were planning not to come?”
I smiled along with him.
“Of course not.”
“Good. When that time comes, congratulate me, and act as an older brother to my kids, too. Those are all things we can do only if we survive. As long as we live, we’ll meet again someday.”
“Yes.”
“So now, enough.”
At that moment, Uncle Hwang picked up a shovel lying on the ground and charged at the masked man.
“Go-!”
Clang!
The instant the sound of iron striking iron rang out, I began running like mad.
The commotion behind me grew distant. For a moment, I thought I heard someone scream behind me. Was it Uncle Hwang, or someone else…?
My breath grew ragged, and the corners of my eyes grew hot.
‘The ancestral hall, I have to get to the ancestral hall…’
The ancestral hall was where the spirit tablets of the Xiao clan’s ancestors were enshrined.
If you passed through the moon gate beside the main residence where the master lived, a modest building would appear. That was the ancestral hall.
The ancestral hall was just a short distance away if I followed the covered corridor connected to the main residence, but doing so would risk drawing attention. Just as Uncle Hwang had told me, I chose to blend into the crowd and take a wide route around.
“Huff, huff…”
I ran like mad. Before I knew it, everything around me was becoming increasingly blurred. The screams and sobbing also grew distant. I could see nothing but what was ahead of me. I simply ran forward, thinking that I had to somehow reach the ancestral hall.
Before long, I drew close to the main residence, and I could also see the round moon gate beside it. There it was. Now, if I could just get past that…
Tap.
That was when I heard footsteps pursuing me from behind.
I stopped in my tracks. Only then did I look around, and there was no one there. There was only me.
No, there was only the person behind me and me.
I slowly turned around.
The black-masked man was standing behind me. My thoughts became tangled in confusion. Could he be the same person who had blocked our path earlier? Then what happened to Uncle Hwang? What happened to him? Did he escape?
Or if not…
“Ah…”
Without realizing it, I took a step backward. I could see the masked man tightening his grip on his sword.
A thought suddenly occurred to me.
‘Can I really go to the ancestral hall like this?’
According to Uncle Hwang, the people who remained were gathered at the ancestral hall. There was a high chance that the master, and of course the young lady, were there too.
But if I went to the ancestral hall to save myself, and if the masked man didn’t kill me but merely chased me like a rat, the situation would become even more serious.
Our hiding place would be discovered, exposing everyone. And then, if we were all massacred…
‘That can’t happen.’
Only then did I think I understood what Uncle Hwang had felt when he sent me away. I also knew that I would make the same choice he had.
In the end, I gave up on running.
The black-masked man was approaching, one step, then another.
Along with the fear of death, I felt a strange sense of relief. It was an odd feeling. I had thought I would feel wronged if I died like this, but perhaps because I had done my best until now, I had no regrets.
Yeah. Wasn’t this death acceptable in its own way? I would be dying to protect other people. It wouldn’t be a meaningless sacrifice…
I simply watched the sword flying toward me.
“Don’t…!”
A small body stepped in front of me.
In that instant, time seemed to slow down.
A light purple maid’s uniform fluttered.
A round, white face turned toward me. It was a familiar face. That face I had seen every single day was…
“Aso-!”
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