Chapter 140 - In the Days of a Foolish Beast

The Drunken Demon's face flushed red. I couldn't tell whether it was the alcohol, the sunset, or the shame he had buried for so many years.

"We'll need more drinks."

I had been about to stand, but sat back down.

I knew why the Blood Heaven Saber Demon and the Single Flower Sword Supreme were on bad terms. They had once had romantic feelings for each other, then parted badly. But I hadn't known the Drunken Demon had played a part in their breakup.

"The Sword Supreme and I had long been in the habit of drinking and talking together now and then. One day, she asked me whether I knew what sort of man the Saber Demon was. I asked why she wanted to know. She said he'd painted her a picture. I asked what kind and told her to show me. It was a portrait of her—a painting of a beauty. The moment I saw that he'd made her even more beautiful than she was in person, I knew. Ah, the Saber Demon likes her. It struck me immediately."

This was back when they were young. The Blood Heaven Saber Demon painting a picture for a woman! I truly couldn't imagine it.

"Sure enough, after that, the Saber Demon began showing his interest in her more and more. He invited her to tea, took walks with her. She told me all about their meetings. Do you know how that made me feel?"

"Bad?"

"Very."

"Were you in love with the Sword Supreme too?"

"Not from the start. Once the Saber Demon took an interest in her, I suddenly felt pressed for time. Until then, I'd thought she was in love with the cult leader. I assumed she wouldn't accept anyone else, but I was wrong. What she felt for him was pure respect."

I filled his cup. He stared blankly into it, recalling the past.

"One day, while we were drinking, I subtly let her know how I felt about her. But..."

He couldn't go on. I sighed and said it for him.

"She turned you down."

He nodded slowly.

"She said her heart was drawn to the Saber Demon."

Suddenly, he shouted.

"Does that make any sense? Does it? That scrawny, ugly Saber Demon—and he was so much older than us! I was so furious I couldn't sleep a wink. I was angry at myself for not being more careful about confessing, and angrier still that she'd seen how flustered I was when she rejected me."

The Drunken Demon held nothing back, telling me honestly everything that had happened.

"This thought tormented me. Had I really liked her that much? Or had hearing that she liked the Saber Demon simply made me unwilling to let someone else have her, driving me to confess? What a fucking idiot, making excuses like that just because he'd been rejected! I couldn't sleep for days."

There was an innocence to that side of him that was hard to imagine in the devious Drunken Demon of today.

"Isn't that the age when we're all foolish beasts driven by instinct?"

"You aren't, though, are you?"

I had been, too.

"Damn it! Just thinking about those days makes me want to die of embarrassment and frustration!"

He sprang to his feet and paced back and forth through the pavilion. Then he leaned against the railing and looked out at the lake, which had now grown dark.

"From that day on, my feelings became twisted. I didn't show it, but I wanted to break them apart somehow. Yet as time passed, her affection for him only grew. Then, one day..."

He lit the lamp attached to a pillar of the pavilion. Getting angry, talking, pacing, lighting a lamp—his tangled feelings came through in every action. The lamplight brightened our surroundings.

"I was walking down the corridor of a pleasure house when I heard the Saber Demon's voice. He was drinking with martial artists from the Southern Saber Sect. Perhaps he'd mentioned the Sword Supreme, because they were asking him about her. How much did he like her? Had he kissed her? Had he slept with her? The usual things friends say when they get together, but I was beside myself with rage. Those bastards!"

He drained his cup, and I drank with him. Perhaps it was the mood, but the liquor wasn't making me drunk. I felt as though I were standing beside his younger self in that pleasure house corridor.

"I should have kicked the door open and raised hell right then. You sons of bitches! Shut up!"

"Why didn't you?"

"It felt as though breaking down that door would mean the end of my life, too."

We knew better now. Nothing much would have happened. Looking back, it would merely have been another day we'd fought and made a fucking scene.

"When I saw her the next day, I told her about it. I said I'd seen the Saber Demon at a pleasure house the night before. That alone would have upset her, but I added things that weren't true. I passed off what his companions had been babbling about as things he'd said himself. I told her he'd been talking about kissing her. I still vividly remember how wildly my heart pounded as I said it. Was I really doing something this despicable? Was this all I amounted to? My heart raced, and my mind berated me, but my mouth was saying, 'Men always show off in front of courtesans.' I didn't even know whether there'd been any courtesans in that room."

CRUNCH.

The railing tore away in his hand. I could sense anger and regret in his drunken eyes. Now I knew exactly where that empty look had come from.

"Some time later, she told me she'd had a terrible fight with him, and they'd broken up. From that day onward, they fought every time they met."

"Did you keep driving a wedge between them afterward?"

He shook his head.

"There was no need. Once their relationship went wrong, the rift widened beyond anyone's control. These days, though, I do it freely. Sometimes she and I drink just for the pleasure of bad-mouthing him together."

"Have you ever considered apologizing to them?"

"I have."

"Then why haven't you?"

"If I'd had some grand reason, perhaps I could have apologized to her. But I couldn't bring myself to admit I'd done it out of jealousy. Or perhaps I still don't want things to work out between them."

He looked at me and added,

"That's the petty, despicable man I am."

"I know."

"What?"

"Did you think I considered you upright and honest? You're devious and nasty..."

"Enough!"

Apparently, hearing someone else speak ill of him still made his blood boil.

"What did I do that was so wrong? If a few words were enough to break them up, they were going to split anyway! Weren't they? He really did go to that pleasure house, and he really did bring her up in the first place! Who told him to go there? Who told him to run into me there? Damn it!"

I realized that the Saber Demon and the Sword Supreme weren't the only ones who had been fighting all these years. Perhaps the Drunken Demon had fought the fiercest battle of all.

"You're right. If they truly loved each other, that shouldn't have shaken them. Even if you'd left them alone, they would have broken up over something else."

"Exactly! Right?"

With me taking his side, he came over beside me, grinning. Then he suddenly sighed.

"When she said they'd broken up, I wasn't happy at all."

It was time to ask why.

"Why did you tell me all this?"

"You kept asking, didn't you? Why I'd approached you. Not long ago, while we were drinking, she told me you wanted her and the Saber Demon to be your left and right wings."

"Did you come to cut off my wings? Or have you come to attach them now, so we can fly together?"

He shook his head.

"I don't know myself. Seeing them spending time together with you at the center, I simply thought I should join in. I never expected to tell you even this."

"Do you feel better now that you've said it all?"

"I'm already regretting it. Why did I have to reveal this pathetic business with my own mouth? I must have been possessed. I got completely sucked in by that talk of half-pure intentions or whatever it was."

He flopped onto the floor and stared blankly up at the pavilion ceiling.

"You'll think of this whenever you see me."

"I suppose I will. Honestly, what a hopeless older brother I have."

He laughed at that. His quiet laughter grew louder and louder. After a hearty laugh, he asked,

"Will you tell them the truth?"

I shook my head.

"That's not my decision to make."

"What if I intend never to tell them?"

"Then don't."

"I really won't."

"Then don't."

He sprang up and looked at me.

"Don't you want them to reconcile?"

"Would learning the truth really make them happier?"

"!"

"Their hatred for you aside, they'd feel even more sorrow over the fact that their love failed for such a reason. Since they can't undo it, that regret would be all the greater. And could they really start loving each other anew at this point? Would that work? In the end, all three of you would be unhappier than you are now."

I believed this truth should stay buried forever. The Blood Heaven Saber Demon might lose his temper and try to kill him. Even if he succeeded, he would have to pay the price himself. And how would the Sword Supreme feel, caught between them? After all, this had happened because the Drunken Demon liked her, too.

"Think of it as having only one chance to reveal the truth, and having just used that chance on me."

Whether he had told me or not would make an enormous difference. This past that clung to him like a specter wasn't something he could fight alone.

"Once you're free of the compulsion to reveal the truth, you might actually be better able to help them reconcile. Start making an effort to get along with the Blood Heaven Saber Demon. When you drink with the Sword Supreme, praise him instead of bad-mouthing him. If you do that, perhaps an unexpected chance to bring them together will arise someday. Give me my wings, even now."

"You should be the older brother."

"No, thank you. Teasing my hopeless brother is only fun if he's older than me."

His expression grew noticeably easier. Having said everything, he seemed relieved.

"There is one promise you must keep."

"What is it?"

"Drink less, and eat with your liquor. Now that things have come to this, I have to make sure my hopeless older brother lives a long life."

I didn't know whether today would mark a turning point in his fate. Even after this, would he eventually die of an illness brought on by drinking, or would he live a different life?

Perhaps changing his fate would make him die even sooner. But that was all right. Any death would be better than the end he had met through drink.

"Brother, let's have one last cup. I can't drink any more. And... thank you for being honest with me."

I had never seen that expression on his face before as he looked at me. Could we preserve these looks we gave each other until the very end?

"Little brother... thank you."

He clinked his cup against mine.

* * *

The next day, Father summoned me.

When I entered Heavenly Demon Hall, I sensed that the atmosphere was different from usual. Grand Strategist Sima Myeong was there, as was my brother, Geom Muyang.

After I greeted Father and Sima Myeong, Geom Muyang spoke to me.

"You reek of liquor. Coming before Father smelling of alcohol?"

"I drank a little too much yesterday. With the man who loves liquor most in the Cult."

I had deliberately brought up the Drunken Demon. Geom Muyang made an effort to remain composed.

"Yes, I've heard you've been spending a lot of time with him lately. Don't drink too much."

He was probably displeased. He would want the Drunken Demon to come to me and cause trouble, yet it must have looked as though we were having a wonderful time together.

Even so, he was trying hard not to show his feelings. My brother truly became a different person in Father's presence.

"Shouldn't you be more careful?"

"What do you mean?"

"I hear you've been spending time with the Poison King. Mine is liquor, but yours is poison, isn't it? Be careful, Brother."

Despite Father's presence, a tense battle of nerves unfolded. I deliberately made no effort to hide it, either from Father or from my brother.

As the Drunken Demon's case showed, feelings hidden away over and over eventually caused trouble. Fighting and sparring openly like this was the right way to wage a battle that would keep my brother alive. When you vented your anger openly, you hurled insults. When you kept it inside, you sent assassins.

Father watched our exchange with an unreadable look, then nodded to Sima Myeong as a signal.

The strategist stepped forward.

"Today, each of you young masters will be assigned a different mission."

He held two red envelopes in his hand.

At last, the moment had come. The real tests to determine the successor had begun.

"To ensure fairness, please choose whichever one you prefer."

The sight of those envelopes stirred my heart.

I remembered this day before my regression. The two missions we had been given.

My brother had succeeded, and I had failed.

By botching this mission, I had put the position of successor completely beyond my reach.

Just as he had in the past, my brother gave me the first choice again.

"Pick first. Don't regret choosing the wrong one later."