Chapter 19

Requiem

They were the Black Skull Sect.

And they were martial artists.

Superhumans born with the talent to wield the mysterious power known as qi in the form of internal energy.

No one stood in their way.

***

The two giants cut through the crowd of busy people.

The street was still noisy and crowded, but no one met their eyes, and no one blocked the path they walked.

As they walked, they snatched up a wine jar from people drinking at a nearby tavern and gulped it down. They also ate several skewers being grilled at a street stall.

But no one stopped them.

Even the patrolling government soldiers merely pretended not to see them.

They were more than a head taller than even the well-fed soldiers, with physiques that looked less like human bodies and more like bulls.

Through the loosely worn upper garments that showed they cared nothing for the cold, dozens—no, hundreds—of black skull tattoos and scars, large and small, were clearly visible.

A short while later, they arrived at the street where the mask workshop was located.

“Ah, looks like that’s the place.”

The mask artisan’s workshop was in a quiet inner alley, away from the main road.

They stood at the entrance of the alley and looked at the mask artisan’s workshop.

“...Doesn’t look like that mask artisan bastard to me either.”

“Right?”

At the entrance of the mask workshop, by the shop display, sat a boy dressed in plain white cotton clothes.

There were people passing by here and there, but the way the boy silently carved only the piece of wood in his hand looked endlessly bored, and at the same time endlessly relaxed.

“Did he... have a disciple?”

“We can just ask him directly.”

The people passing through the alley noticed the giants and turned around, scattering away.

Perhaps the boy had not noticed the two giants approaching, for he simply kept his head lowered, wholly focused on carving the piece of wood.

“Hey.”

“Where did the mask artisan bastard go?”

The carving knife stopped.

The boy, who had been working with his head deeply lowered, raised his face.

“...?!”

The two giants’ eyebrows twitched.

On the boy’s face was a mask with no pattern and not even eyeholes.

The white sheen flowing over the roughly finished mask somehow gleamed ominously.

To think they had been startled by something like a mask, even if only for an instant.

For their usual selves, such a thing would have been impossible.

“Hey, brat. Your elders are asking you a question.”

He subtly released his pressure.

To an ordinary person, it would have made their throat go numb and chills run over their body, like a woodcutter facing a tiger.

But the masked boy showed not the slightest sign of fear.

Rather, he even seemed relaxed enough to let out a crooked grin.

The boy’s neat white teeth were revealed.

“Do you happen to know the face of Avalokitesvara?”

At the sudden, absurd question, the giants felt displeased.

Normally, either one of them would already have swung a fist.

Their fists were clearly larger than the ominous boy’s head, and they could have smashed his skull more easily than crushing a dry leaf.

However, neither of them did so.

No—they could not.

Something felt wrong.

Uncomfortable.

“Then again, what would be the point of discussing the Buddhist path with the likes of you?”

The boy giggled as he stood up.

Then, before they could even react, he slipped into the shop.

There was no sound of footsteps.

Only the boy’s low laughter spread out emptily.

When they came to their senses, all that remained where the boy had been sitting were wood shavings.

“...Hah, fuck.”

Even when one of them spat out a curse to raise his nerve, it merely scattered emptily into the air.

Was this not the same as being bewitched by a ghost in broad daylight?

Because of their pride, they could neither retreat nor immediately follow him in.

“...What was that?”

“I don’t know either.”

The inside of the shop, where the boy had slipped away, was covered in deep shadow.

It was midday sunlight, so it was only natural for shadows to be dark where the light was bright. And yet, for some reason, it did not feel like mere darkness to them.

“Still, shouldn’t we grab him and beat the hell out of him?”

When he drew up his internal energy with all his might, at least a little confidence returned.

“...Yeah. We should.”

They were men who considered twisting off a person’s neck and pulling it out to be a trivial matter.

Their fists had always moved before their words, and they had beaten to death more than a few martial artists with some reputation of their own.

The way they were acting now was clearly abnormal, but they themselves did not even properly realize it.

They headed into the shop, following the boy who had already disappeared into the darkness.

The walls of the shop were filled with masks.

According to the report from their subordinates who had come here yesterday, they had supposedly wrecked everything from the outside to the inside.

And they had heard that everything worth money had been taken away.

So why, in this shop shrouded in thick darkness, were such splendid masks hanging everywhere?

In all sorts of colors, in all sorts of shapes, some smiling and some weeping, the masks somehow seemed to be looking at them.

“Isn’t this some kind of sorcery?”

The answer came a moment later.

“...I don’t know either.”

What they had seen and heard of as sorcery was nothing more than cheap tricks that deceived the senses through sleight of hand and misdirection.

There was no way such tricks could work on superhumans who possessed internal energy, a power that broke past the limits of humanity.

“...Is it this way?”

“...I think so.”

When the corridor lined with masks, which had for some reason felt far too long, finally ended, a small side door came into view.

It had been a straight corridor, so the boy must have passed through that side door.

If they entered, there would likely be an inner courtyard, followed by the space used as the workshop and the living quarters.

Light seeped in through the slight gap in the side door, and somehow, that sunlight felt incredibly welcome.

Before they knew it, the two men, whose minds had been pushed close to their limits, walked quickly toward the side door.

It was closer to running than walking.

The moment the giant in front reached the side door and pushed it open—

“...Huh?!”

A white hand reached out from within and seized him by the throat.

“Kok?!”

He had already drawn up his internal energy and prepared himself for anything.

The giant protected his seized throat with internal energy and, at the same time, grabbed that arm with both hands.

With his natural monstrous strength and the power of his internal energy, that thin arm should have been crushed more easily than a dry branch.

However—

“...!”

That white grip dug in with terrifying ease, as though tearing through the throat he had protected with internal energy.

His own grip, into which he poured all his strength, could not crush the other party’s arm. It could not even leave fingernail marks on that cold skin.

Then, without even leaving behind a scream, he vanished as though sucked through the side door.

“B-Brother?!”

The giant left alone fell backward in shock.

He scrambled up and ran in the opposite direction.

He could no longer even tell whether what he was using was a movement technique or a footwork technique, but he threw his body forward as if his life depended on it.

And yet, for some reason, the alley bathed in sunlight right over there felt terribly far away.

It seemed to be growing farther and farther.

“Kugh!”

Perhaps his mind had rushed too far ahead.

His legs tangled, and he fell.

It was a disgraceful sight.

There could hardly be a more disgraceful sight than this.

Even if he had submitted to the strong and bowed to power, when had he ever fallen so low?

But he could not even feel that.

He tried to spring to his feet, but one leg would not move.

Something was holding his ankle.

It was that same pale white hand.

“U-Uaaaaaagh!”

His ankle felt as though it were freezing and burning at the same time.

Would it feel like this if dozens of oxen and horses pulled at once?

That hand dragged his body inward with strength beyond imagination.

The giant dug his fingers into the ground to avoid being pulled in.

His fingers, filled with internal energy, sank into the paving stones beneath him.

But his speed did not slow in the slightest.

Sparks flew, and his fingernails broke.

His fingers snapped.

Even so, he could not stop.

“S-Save me! Save—!”

He tried to grab the doorframe and hold on with the last of his internal energy, but it was useless.

The doorframe he had grabbed itself shattered, and his figure disappeared through the side door.

Clatter—clatter—

In the empty shop, only the side door that had devoured the two men swayed leisurely.

Somehow, it seemed as though the laughter of the masks was echoing through the place.

***

Yeon So-hyeon had known that if he showed himself at the mask artisan’s workshop, the Black Skull Sect would send someone.

He had leisurely carved away while letting the small fry loitering in the distance go free, and those small fry had brought back proper big fish.

Whether of the Black Path or the White Path, martial artists were valuable people. Naturally, their positions within their organizations were high, and the quality of the information they knew was good.

The same was true of these big fish.

However, Yeon So-hyeon’s face was dissatisfied.

“No, no. Was it this?”

He crouched on the dirt floor and fidgeted with both hands.

Then he stepped back a little, studied it carefully, and shook his head.

“I do not think this expression is right either...”

Then he approached again and looked at the two heads.

Their bodies were nowhere to be seen, and the giants, reduced to only heads, wore the most agonized expressions in the world.

Their tongues hung out long, and in their bulging eyes, every blood vessel had burst, leaving trails of blood that had flowed down and dried in streaks.

The head rolling beside them was not much different, except for a slight difference in expression.

Yeon So-hyeon clicked his tongue for no real reason, sat down on the dirt floor, and lifted the carving he had been diligently working on.

It was a statue of Avalokitesvara whose face had not yet been carved.

“It is difficult to know, no matter what.”

It was not a problem of memory.

He remembered countless Buddhist paintings he had seen, down to even the smallest details.

However...

“Merely imitating the shape is not enough.”

What sort of face did the Buddha, symbol of endless benevolence and mercy, have?

What kind of face did the Buddha within his own heart have?

After being lost in thought for a moment, Yeon So-hyeon’s carving knife moved as if dancing.

There were few miscellaneous skills he had not touched, and it would be faster to count them from the back. Carving, too, was one of his domains.

His hand moved without hesitation, clearly shaping the form.

“...It is complete.”

Yeon So-hyeon turned around and placed the completed carving atop the burial mound.

He placed the carving knife there as well.

It was the joint grave of the mask artisan’s family, which Yeon So-hyeon had made for them.

The warm midday sunlight fell upon the new grave, which was merely covered with red soil.

Yeon So-hyeon looked up at the sky for a moment and murmured softly.

“Mock them. Laugh at them. Ridicule them. Scorn them. That will be the only resistance you can offer...”

And by now—

That needlessly diligent “gatekeeper” was surely searching for him desperately enough to turn all of Luoyang upside down.

Letting out a soft chuckle, Yeon So-hyeon disappeared from the graveside.

The cold winter wind swept past the two heads rolling carelessly on the ground.

Yeon So-hyeon’s statue of Avalokitesvara lay atop the grave, shining white.

Instead of a benevolent expression, the face of that Avalokitesvara had a mask carved over it, covering the face.

It was the same shape as the mask Yeon So-hyeon had received.

Its twisted expression mocked the world, and its unopened eyeholes turned away from it.