Fate

Xiya's mind was confused as she listened to Yuan Zhaoxian's story.

His story, mixing past and future, could only be confusing to her.

"Do you intend to carry out what you think is right even if numerous sacrifices follow?"

Xiya had thought that even if there were sacrifices, it would only be herself and those who shared her will.

"Even if innocent people who had nothing to do with it end up dying because of your actions?"

"That couldn't happen!"

At that answer, Zhaoxian turned to look at her.

"Uh?!"

Xiya's pupils dilated.

Her eyes were filled with the sight of a white, crooked mask that was crude yet incomparably eerie.

The masked Yuan Zhaoxian slowly raised his hand.

"That must have been why. That's why those who kept such goodness deep in their hearts perished alone."

As he raised his hand, the cold winter wind brushed past it.

"In the end, to change the flow of the great river called history, that much blood must flow."

As he waved his hand, somehow the wind seemed to grow stronger.

Xiya shivered in that freezing wind.

"But those good people cannot watch countless innocent ones being sacrificed enough to twist the river's flow."

He tried to grasp that cold wind, but the wind only scattered and flowed.

"Thus, even if their names remained as dishonor and were tainted, they sacrificed only themselves."

He lowered his hand after waving at empty air.

"Even though nothing changed as a result."

His masked face tilted to the side.

"...Were those sacrifices in vain? Was that ultimately the sisters' inevitable fate?"

Xiya couldn't follow Yuan Zhaoxian's story.

"I don't understand what..."

But Yuan Zhaoxian was no longer there.

"In my youth, I dreamed of changing the world, but I realized it was a wicked dream."

His voice was extremely gloomy.

"Since then, I've lived making contentment in poverty and following the Way my life's wish."

Xiya quickly turned toward the direction of the voice.

"?!"

Zhaoxian was somehow standing on the wall, looking down at her.

She couldn't understand what kind of magic Yuan Zhaoxian had just performed.

Had the Sword Clan's Swordless One been hiding his martial arts?

But she felt a deeper shadow beyond mere martial arts.

"But because of my born status, contentment in poverty was impossible."

Though the distance between him and Xiya was far, somehow she felt like she was hearing his voice right beside her.

"So I sought tranquility. I hoped that if I abandoned desire again and again, I could be free like wind passing through a net."

His voice had a metallic quality that seemed to scratch at the eardrums.

"I failed."

He dramatically spread both hands toward the sky.

"I ultimately failed to change the fate I was born with. In the end, I knelt under the stars that ruled me."

Though his movements were exaggerated like an actor in a play, they weren't ridiculous, but drew out deep emotional tremors.

"...However, your sisters' fate is not yet decided."

It was no longer the First Young Master's voice.

It couldn't even be called a human voice.

That voice that seemed made purely of deep metal was full of rough, cruel, and somehow sad resonance.

"I will watch your sisters' fate."

There were no eye holes to be found in that mask.

But somehow Xiya felt a gaze far clearer than meeting someone's eyes up close.

"I will watch whether your fate will intersect with mine, or whether it can overlap."

His figure wearing the white mask and scholar's white clothes began melting into the darkness.

"My path is the netherworld demon path where mountains of corpses and seas of blood spread beyond human bounds."

Into the deep darkness, into the blade-like winter wind, his figure disappeared as if melting, as if scattering.

"May we not meet upon it..."

Were his parting words a prayer of concern, or mockery of fate?

As if entranced, Xiya endlessly stared at the wall where the First Young Master had vanished.

Eventually the clouds cleared, and moonlight beautifully illuminated the tiles on the wall.

But under that soft, gentle moonlight, the First Young Master was gone.

***

For an organization like the Black Bone Faction that operated in back alleys, rapid personnel losses were inevitable.

Nevertheless, the Black Bone Faction was the organization that most easily recruited new members throughout all of Luoyang.

Luoyang was a massive and luxurious commercial city where millions lived, and what supported that splendor was an even greater darkness.

People whose numbers even government offices didn't dare try to count lived in the slums.

'Want to survive in the slums? Then join.'

The Black Bone Faction wasn't the kind of organization that required special skills to join.

In fact, it didn't matter if you were lacking in more than one area.

Rather, that was better.

Lacking things like human compassion, common sense, mercy - such deficiencies were far more advantageous for recruitment.

And such 'lacking ones' overflowed in the slums.

The rest didn't matter.

Once they joined and lived with their brothers and sisters, they naturally became completed as excellent Black Bone Faction members.

Today too, their numbers were steadily increasing like that.

***

In a scene common to any slum in Luoyang, there was a Black Bone Faction branch.

Though they called it a branch, a fancy name, it was at best just a den.

"Yawn..."

The brute guarding the den's entrance was an example of one who had become an excellent member through the above process.

His father had lost his life to bandits while working at a courier station (at least that's what he'd heard).

While his mother did her best to survive, he too did his best alone, and somehow survived.

Through that growth process, he realized he had far more things he didn't have than things he had.

And he also realized that was a rule that could never be overturned.

So he joined the Black Bone Faction.

He became absorbed in venting all his accumulated resentment and grudges together with his new brothers.

The skull tattoos carved into his body increased one by one.

He was grateful that this path was surprisingly suitable to his disposition.

'Finally just a few more jobs and I'll get promoted. Hehe, then I'll take that woman next door first with the underlings I'll get...'

He even had such constructive future plans.

Just thinking about roaming the streets leading his future subordinates made his chest swell with pride.

Then there would be no one in the neighborhood who would look down on him.

Actually, he didn't mind if they looked down on him a bit.

That attracted him more.

Wasn't that why he wanted to press down on that woman next door who always looked at him like dirt?

"Is this the Black Bone Faction branch?"

He was in the middle of imagining what would happen with the woman next door, making his groin feel heavy.

He waved his hand dismissively.

"Get lost."

But the other party was persistent.

"I'm asking if this is the Black Bone Faction branch?"

He sighed.

"Kid. We don't take scrawny little bastards like you, so get lost while I'm being nice."

"I'm not particularly asking to be taken though?"

The boy who held his head high shrugged his shoulders.

Normally he would have beaten up someone wearing such an 'unpleasant mask' right away, but right now he was in a very good mood.

"Fine. This big brother will specially give you an interview."

He showed his fist covered in thick calluses at each joint.

"Try taking two hits. Then I'll specially recommend you to be accepted."

A laugh that openly mocked him leaked out from under the mask that shone pure white in the moonlight.

"I'm telling you I didn't come to join. What a dull creature."

"You little fuck, then what?!"

Below the mask covering half his face, the boy's mouth split to reveal sharp teeth.

"Huh? Hu...?!"

The brute wanted to scream but no sound came out.

Not only could he not make a sound, he couldn't move his body either.

He couldn't understand what he was seeing.

"Since you're a 'gatekeeper' too, I'll kindly tell you..."

That thing which had somehow approached beside him stood on tiptoes and whispered in his ear.

Its breath was a coldness that seemed to freeze flesh.

"I've come to devour all of you."

"...?!"

When that thing lightly pushed the brute, an irresistible massive force sent him flying.

He flew lightly through the entrance he had been guarding, bounced two or three times in the filthy narrow corridor before he could stop.

"Uu, uh..."

He couldn't even breathe from the impact.

Pain raced through his mind.

While he writhed like an insect rubbing his back against the floor, that thing approached with light footsteps.

It looked down at him and smiled.

It was a pure, clear smile, but inside that mouth were densely packed teeth like awls or needles.

He felt a terror he had never experienced before from that smile.

"Now then, let's have you sing a song."

"Uugh!"

What song was he supposed to sing in this situation?

Soon he had the opportunity to understand that thing's words all too clearly through his body.

"If we list what's important when singing songs, first would be breathing."

That thing's hand crept toward his abdomen.

"And breathing starts here."

That appearance had something comical about it, like performers putting on a show.

"Now, take a deep breath-"

The hand that reached the center of his abdomen mercilessly dug into it.

"Kuuuuuaaaaaaaaahhhhh!!"

The hand digging into his stomach was terribly cold.

And then some terribly hot energy began melting his internal organs.

"You've completely mastered the first stage!"

The brute's movements ceased as his internal organs melted from the Dark Scripture's demon energy.

"Too bad you won't have a chance to learn the second stage."

Giggling, the mask shook as it let out bizarre laughter.

It was the result of an incomplete mask becoming complete as a demon through meeting madness and resentment.

"Wh-what?!"

"What kind of bastard?!"

Black Bone Faction members who were startled by the brute's death throes rushed out with weapons.

The scream was so terrible that some had run out barefoot from sleep.

But regardless of rushing out relatively quickly, they all had to stop in the corridor.

"Uh, uuh?!"

Everyone lost their words.

Their dead comrade's abdomen was punctured through, and melted organs and bubbling blood flowed thickly down the tilted corridor.

And that thing which seemed to have just jumped out of a nightmare waved its hand covered in bright red blood to greet them.

"Hello everyone. Isn't it a lovely night?"