Chapter 38: The Method Of Avoiding The Wind (2) (2/2)

If this had been for real, she would’ve lost her head, but I turned my sword sideways and hit her with the blunt side.

Smack! My blade landed on her shoulder.

“Kuahh!”

She raised her sword and tried to block my attack.

Smack! Smack! Smack! Smack!

I continuously attacked her shoulder, ribs, and stomach. My last two blows landed on her face.

“Asga.s.sii!”

Soo Ran rushed to Song Hwa Rin’s side to make sure she was okay. Thankfully, she was still consciousness.

After confirming this, Soo Ran started berating me, “Are you crazy?! How could you do this?!”

“This was a fair fight. Did you expect me to go easy on her, just because she’s female?”

Hearing my words, Soo Ran couldn’t say anything. She frowned.

I knew that she was pretty angry, but I added something. This was something that I really needed to say so that it became more believable. “This is revenge for last time.”

Soo Ran’s face became even uglier. She really wanted to jump at me.

However, Song Hwa Rin grabbed her arm. When Soo Ran looked back towards her, Song Hwa Rin was shaking her head. She was telling her not to.

“…I lost. That, and…”

From the ground, she stared at me with her eyes half opened. It wasn’t a stare full of resentment.

“…that last move…?”

She’d been able to sense it.

I gave her a mischievous smile and nodded. I hadn’t hit her just to win. Through our exchange, I’d sensed a major flaw in her sword art. And it was with one of the most important stances of it. Thus, I clearly saw through it and took advantage of it.

If she wasn’t able to correct this weakness by herself, she could be killed by anyone that sees through it. And Song Hwa Rin had just realized it through my last attack. She never would’ve thought that her flawless sword stance would crumble this easily. She realized that it wasn’t just luck that I’d been able to see through her flaw.

“Later…” She said before pa.s.sing out. Did she want to say that she wanted to have another round of sparring later? Or something else?

Soo Ran picked her up and rushed inside. Even though everyone might worry about her condition, they didn’t have anything to worry about, as I’d hit been smart about how I hit her. She’d be bedridden for about ten days, and her face would be bruised for awhile, but she’d be perfectly fine after a month or so.

Had I come here just to let her gain some real experience, or just to expose the flaw in her sword art?

Of course—not. I’d come here because of Ma Jung Soo.

I’d seen how he took care of business. He’d make some sort of an excuse to get close to her, then would visit her at her house the next day. However, after seeing her like this, he wouldn’t be able to do anything to her. If he still tried to approach her like this, then I’ll definitely kill him. I don’t care if the entire Heavenly Dao Gate comes to San Dong because of it; I’ll take care of them when that happens.

Originally, I wanted to go directly to Song Wu Kyung and tell him the truth. I wanted to ask him to send Song Hwa Rin far away. There was a possibility that she’d say no, but if she did leave, there’s a possibility that she could be in more of a danger since she’d be out of my sight, considering the fact that he could send some men after her. And I gave some other excuse he would try to find out what happened.[a] Thus, if she was lying in bed with real injuries, he wouldn’t be able to do anything, which was a good enough reason. Even though I’d been reborn, it was revenge from before. This was the best option I had available to buy some time with.

Since I’d taken such a drastic measure, I felt sorry for her and her father. But in the given time that I had, I couldn’t find a simpler method. I wasn’t Kal Sa Ryang. All of this could very well be me overthinking my bad premonition; Ma Jung Soo might not even have any interest in Song Hwa Rin. However, I’d done this just in case. As they always say: You can never be too prepared.

I headed straight home. There was something else I needed to do before attending the banquet. If my objective was simply to kill Ma Jung Soo, it would’ve been easy no matter who my opponent was, as that was the thing I did best. However, my objective was to rob him of everything he had,which was no simple task. Considering the fact that I usually leave all the planning to Kal Sa Ryang, it was pretty hard trying to do it myself now.

However I was certain that getting rid of his money would be more effective than killing any the three experts that he’d brought. If his money was gone, he’d be confused and there’d be disorder in his camp. This was the power of money. No matter how close you are to someone, money can cause a divide among you.

The question now was where his money was kept, and who controlled it. Was it Ma Jung Soo himself? Old Man Flower Fan? Si Gon? Or that mysterious women?

Well we can check Old Man Flower Fan off the list, since he’s old and an outsider. There’s also no way that Ma Jung Soo would trust an outsider with his money. Thus, using similar reasoning we can check off that mysterious women.

Then was it Si Gon?

But Si Gon is a true Martial Artist. There’s no way he’d be good at dealing with money.

Then that only leaves Ma Jung Soo himself. Is he personally in charge of his funds?

This has the highest probability of being the truth.

After hearing my summons, Kw.a.n.g Du quickly came to my room.

“Did you call me?”

“I need you to look into something.”

Seeing my expression, Kw.a.n.g Du became nervous. “What is it?”

“You should have heard about an important person from the Heavenly Dao Gate arriving couple of days ago.”

“Of course.”

He looked around, then lowered his voice and asked, “I heard that he ripped off all the clans.”

I proceeded to whisper in his ear, “Why are you whispering, this is my room.”

He whispered back, “It would be bad this reached him, considering that he is the descendant of the Mengju, and from one of the five great clans of the Central Plains.”

“Then I think you’re in trouble.”

“Why?”

“Because you might have to investigate him.”

Kw.a.n.g Du stared blankly at me and blinked a couple times. As I’d said before, the expressions that Kw.a.n.g Du makes were what made me love him.

“So you’re serious.”

“The best way to forget about a girl is by doing work.”

“I think that I’d be able to forget about a hundred girl doing this.”

I smiled and raised my tone back to normal. “It’s nothing too serious, just relax.”

Ridding himself of his playfulness, Kw.a.n.g Du asked, “What do I need to do?”

“He wants to build a school in Jae Nam. I want you to go to Jae Nam and look for anything and everything related to it. Everything from where he’s going to build it, to who’s in charge of construction, to when the construction starts; anything that you can find. There’s definitely something that they’re doing in the shadow.”

I told him all of the details regarding the construction of the martial arts school that I’d heard during our first meeting with Ma Jung Soo. Then I gave him two thousand nyang to use.

“You’re giving me this much?”

“If you need to use it, then use it.”

“Yes.”

“And make sure you come back as soon as possible.”

“Understood young master.”

I knew that I could trust Kw.a.n.g Du with this sort of work—the type where you blend into the crowd to investigate something. He had a natural talent for interacting with others due to his innocent personality.

I felt that he might be feeling lonely, so I said a joke to him, “Should I send Do Soon-ee with you?”

“NO!”

He answered without hesitation.

“Why? Have you already gotten over your feelings?”

“NO! My heart still beats whenever I see her.”

“Then why?”

“Because I don’t want to have hard feelings for her. I don’t want to burn any bridges since we aren’t even in a relations.h.i.+p.”

I nodded in agreement.

“Then, I’ll be off.”

“Go on horseback.”

Kw.a.n.g Du replied with pride, “This time I’ll come back as a horse riding expert, no, I’ll be a centaur when I get back.”

After sending Kw.a.n.g Du away, I headed towards the Yang Clan, where the banquet was going to be held. Though there were many reasons why I hated attending them, this was another reason

Banquets will make people lose concentration.

However, since I knew that, this would be my chance to strike.

‘Now that I’m coming to get you, just how prepared are you?’

[a]This doesn't... is this something like, ”I continued to try to convince myself with excuses that he'd try to find out what happened to her.” ?

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