Chapter 10 - Stairs

The family's?

"The family? You mean our Danri Family?"

"Yes."

Gi Daehyo scratched his chin in thought for a moment, a habit of his whenever something troubled him.

A moment later, he made his decision.

"Where did the two of them kill themselves?"

"The Bongyang Inn."

"Let's go."

"Pardon?"

Gi Manji was surprised that Gi Daehyo intended to go in person. The leader of the Black Crow Unit did not ordinarily take a direct hand in such matters. The usual practice was to issue orders from behind the scenes.

"Surely this doesn't warrant your going personally, Father..."

"No. I need to see it myself."

Cutting Gi Manji off, Gi Daehyo left the Hall of the Black Five without delay.

SWISH!

He immediately deployed his movement technique, all but vanishing eastward—the direction of the Danri Family's main gate.

● ● ●

While Gi Daehyo was on his way to the Bongyang Inn, Dong Bongsu was spending another ordinary day as Sosam the horse handler.

He had already risen early, cleared away the horse dung, and fed the horses. Now came the most important task in his daily routine.

Taking the Sweat-Blood Horse for a walk.

The Danri Family owned only one Sweat-Blood Horse.

Its name was Yeoro, and it was the prized mount of Danri Cheon-u, the head of the family. With its white coat and magnificently flowing mane, Yeoro was by far the most expensive horse in the Danri Family's possession.

For that reason, every horse handler on the estate gave it special care. Even a minor injury to Yeoro might mean a string of funerals among the handlers. In fact, when a small boil had once appeared on its skin, all the handlers had been beaten together.

But nothing of the sort had happened since Dong Bongsu—not Sosam—took charge of Yeoro.

Animals instinctively recognized the "beasts" they must not provoke. Every horse in the eastern stable had grown remarkably docile after Sosam became Dong Bongsu.

They had occasionally caused trouble before, but now that never happened. Even newly acquired wild horses only ran amok at first. The moment their eyes met Dong Bongsu's, they became meek as lambs.

People who saw this whispered among themselves.

["After Sosam got hurt, he lost his speech but gained a horse spirit!"]

Sometimes they even called him the Horse Demon. That was how completely Sosam could control horses. As a result, far fewer people looked down on him.

Naturally, caring for Yeoro became Sosam's responsibility. The Danri Family had several horse handlers, but aside from Danri Cheon-u, Sosam was the only person who could control Yeoro perfectly.

From Dong Bongsu's perspective, there was no reason to refuse the responsibility. Taking charge of Yeoro brought plenty of benefits.

Since taking over Yeoro's care, he had gained a great deal of free time. Fewer people picked fights with him for no reason, and hardly anyone dumped their work on him anymore. Machil, who had tormented him the most, had already sunk into the fires of hell, too.

Naturally, he had more time to spare.

And...

More people in Fengyang were dying of the Suicide Plague.

● ● ●

Dong Bongsu led Yeoro out of the estate and headed for the marketplace in Fengyang. He usually searched for prey during these walks. If possible, he dealt with them on the spot. Sometimes, however, doing so immediately was difficult. In those cases, he observed his targets, committed them to memory, and killed them later.

Yeoro gave him wings not only within the estate but outside it as well. When he led the horse around, people cleared the way of their own accord. Everyone in Fengyang knew whose horse Yeoro was and what it represented.

Horse-Shit Sam borrowing a horse's might.

That was what people called it, saying Horse-Shit Sam was throwing his weight around under the horse's protection. In truth, he was merely walking down the street rather than putting on airs, but perhaps that was how it looked to them.

In any case, Dong Bongsu was reaping the full benefits of Yeoro's presence. Thanks to the horse, he could stroll freely through the marketplace, searching for suitable prey.

But...

'This is no use anymore.'

Dong Bongsu realized it was time to stop hunting this way. He had killed 196 people recently, yet his experience bar was only about a third full. At this rate, there was no telling when he would level up and grow stronger.

In terms of efficiency, he had clearly almost reached the limit of what this approach could offer.

'There's a definite limit to gaining experience this way.'

Just as he was wrestling with that problem, Dong Bongsu finally confirmed beyond doubt that the amount of experience differed from person to person.

The day before yesterday, he had killed a man near here, and his experience bar had filled by a considerable amount. Only then had he discovered just how great the difference between people could be. That last man alone had yielded more experience than the 195 people he had killed before him.

His objective changed.

Instead of simply killing people, he would eliminate stronger people.

Then who were these stronger people?

He had no way to verify it, but he already knew instinctively who would be stronger and where to find them.

Martial artists.

Why wouldn't they be?

Even in games, high-level elite mobs gave dozens of times more experience than the rabbits outside town—perhaps hundreds or even thousands of times more.

That was only natural.

In a world where a leveling system applied...

'That's how it ought to work.'

It was almost certain. Killing martial artists should let him accumulate experience with ease.

But he had never actually sparred or exchanged blows with one. He had only occasionally watched them train on the Danri Family estate.

Judging from those observations...

'Even the weakest warrior in the Danri Family is still beyond me.'

He needed more time to grow stronger.

Or else...

'I need an intermediate step.'

No matter how much an ordinary person practiced high jumping, they could not leap straight to the second floor. They needed stairs, a platform, or perhaps a ladder.

Prey that would bridge the gap between ordinary people and martial artists.

What would that be?

Someone like the man he had killed the day before yesterday. Someone like that would be just right.

'What did that man do for a living? Where can I find more bastards like him?'

Thinking such thoughts, Dong Bongsu strolled casually along his walking route through Fengyang's marketplace.

As he passed an alley, a gruff voice rang out from within.

"Hey, Horse-Shit Sam. Why're you walking right past? Haven't seen your big brother in ages, and you won't even stop for a little face-to-face chat? You fuckin' bastard."

Dong Bongsu turned toward the alley.

Five or six men were squatting there in slovenly poses. The man at the front, looking straight at him, appeared particularly vicious, with bushy sideburns covering his lower face.

'Do Paldu.'

Do Paldu.

He was the leader of the marketplace's gang of thugs. Commanding some twenty ruffians, he was one of the lowlifes who preyed on the small-time vendors there.

With government constables posted all over the alleys lately, he had been out of sight for a while. Yet for some reason, here he was, swaggering about in an easily spotted alley.

The market merchants were not their only prey. Sometimes they also targeted servants and hired hands from great households, like Sosam and Machil. Do Paldu generally avoided troubling them for fear their employers might find out. He was all the more reluctant when that household was a martial clan.

But that only held true when his stomach wasn't empty.

The thugs' eyes were gleaming.

Dong Bongsu could tell at a glance just how hungry they were. Given the mood in Fengyang lately, that was only to be expected. Even when these men came into money, it never lasted more than a day. They spent every coin on drink and women as soon as they got it. With the Suicide Plague running rampant, business must have been utterly dead for men like them.

Today, one might say, they had risked coming down from the mountain to raid the village.

Even wolves descended on human settlements during a terrible drought, and lions driven into a corner sometimes hunted prey as large as elephants.

But they had chosen the wrong target.

The prey they had picked today was not Sosam, but Dong Bongsu.

They simply didn't know it.

Dong Bongsu opened his mouth wide in a vacant grin. Keeping that expression on his face, he approached Do Paldu.

Do Paldu and his thugs took him and Yeoro deeper into the deserted alley. Do Paldu apparently figured that as long as he left Yeoro unharmed, he could do whatever he liked to someone like Sosam.

Before following the thugs into the alley, Dong Bongsu surveyed his surroundings. Perhaps because it was still early in the morning, there were few people around. A handful of merchants were visible in the distance, but this spot was some way from the marketplace's main thoroughfare, and no one was paying attention to the alley.

His reason for looking around was simple.

If he disposed of all these "things" here, how would he clean up afterward? Should he make it look like suicide again?

In principle, that was what he ought to do. But this location was ill suited to it. Staging the suicides of a dozen or so men in an alley would not be easy.

What if he made it look as though they had stabbed one another, or put their bodies in his Inventory and dumped them somewhere else? Neither was a bad option. But being not bad was all they had going for them. There was little actual benefit.

Even killing them all would yield little experience. And if he left them alive, the only disadvantage he would suffer was a few blows and the loss of a little money.

The scales tipped back and forth between benefits, drawbacks, and risk.