Absolute Regression Chapter 572

572
“I am a new recruit of the Baekryongban, Geomyeon. I am not a person of destiny… … .”

Whew.

Before he could finish speaking, Yeon Baek-jin made a surprise attack and attempted to subdue Geommu-geuk’s blood vessel.

However, Geommugeuk lightly twisted his body to avoid the attack.

“I’m writing a drama. I’m a person who will disappear when this is over. Forever.”

Yeon Baek-jin felt a strange trembling as he looked at the empty hands that were clenching the air. Was it fear? No, it was definitely a different emotion from fear.

He could tell. If he saw it as full of vulnerabilities when there were none, then those vulnerabilities were ultimately his own.

“Oh, of course I didn’t come to the Hwangryong Martial Arts Academy to learn martial arts.”

“Then why did you come?”

“I came to help my friend.”

“who?”

There are two reasons why the Geommu Theater appeared today.

First of all, it was because it was confirmed that Yeon Baek-jin was on the side opposing Pyo-san.

Even though not all enemies of the enemy are allies, in this urgent situation where the enemies were trying to kill even the blood relatives of the Gui Moon, it was judged that joining hands with Yeon Baek Jin was not a bad choice.

The second reason, of course, was Seo Jin. If the wheel of fate carrying the two of them were to roll towards destruction, I would gladly get on that wheel together. To do that, I would have to get close to Yeon Baek Jin, even if I don’t know anyone else.

“I am not a member of the ghost clan, but I personally owe a great debt to the ghost clan.”

The answer was that he had come to help Seojin. It wasn’t a lie. I was truly indebted to Gui Moon.

“Would it be possible that the Lord Gui would let his daughter wander around alone?”

“Then what about that woman named Ian?”

The sword dance nodded.

“We are protecting you.”

Are they protecting the daughter of a nobleman?

It was a believable story. The two of them were admitted the day after Seojin came in. Since then, they have been hanging out together.

“I showed myself because I thought that the target of Seojin’s revenge and the enemy of Yeon Daehyeop were the same person.”

The swordmaster took out one of the piled up weapons and handed it to him.

“Do you feel like looking for it together now?”

Yeon Baek-jin threw the sword back into the scrap metal pile.

“I will refuse.”

His gaze turned to the new weapons hanging on the wall.

“There are so many new things coming out every day, so why bother digging through scrap metal?”

Even if what the other person said was true, you couldn’t just believe them.

Yeon Baek-jin turned around and left the place.

“If you’re new, don’t be late for class.”

As Yeon Baek-jin walked toward the entrance, one thing suddenly occurred to him.

‘But did I hear that I asked Pyo-san where that place was?’

Yeon Baek-jin looked back.

But the figure of Geommugeuk disappeared and was never seen again.

* * *

“The Yeon Dae-hyeop became aware of its existence.”

Pyo-san’s burned face was burning hot, but he didn’t have time to apply any medicine.

“As is the nature of the Yeon Dae-hyeop, we will continue to dig.”

Yeon Baek-in, the owner of Hwangryonggwan, just looked out the window without saying a word, carrying his luggage on his back.

The head, Ki-seok, shook his head and told him not to say anything more, but Pyo-san could not hold back and added his last words.

“As long as we know that the Lord will forgive us no matter what we do, the Yeon Daehyeop will continue to try.”

Seriously, if I was alone with Ki-seok, I would have sworn at him first.

Yeonbaek-in sighed lightly and turned towards Pyo-san.

“Yeah, I guess so.”

Then he walked towards Pyo-san with a worried face.

“The burn is bad. Where are you? Are you okay?”

“It’s okay. Thank you for your concern… … .”

Stop.

At Yeonbaekin’s fingertips, the neck of the sign turned at an abnormal angle and then returned to its original position.

It was such a quick move that before I knew it, my neck was broken and I fell to the ground.

Yeonbaek-in, looking down at the corpse, let out a soft groan of anger. The anger that flowed out with a “hmm” wasn’t only directed at Pyo-san.

On the other hand, Ki-seok showed no reaction to the death of Su-jok.

In this situation where Yeon Baek-jin has fully jumped in, I thought it was appropriate to eliminate him. However, since his lips are gone, I will have to grit my teeth now.

“The excavation is in its final stages?”

Ki-seok answered Yeon Baek-in’s question politely.

“Yes. They say it’s almost all the way through. They’ll find the entrance soon.”

Passion flashed across Yeon Baek-in’s eyes. Yes, I have to find it. For that moment, I became the person who twisted the teacher’s neck.

“We’re almost there.”

Yeonbaek-in looked down at Pyo-san’s body again and then looked far out the window.

“Yes, the gates of hell are waiting for us.”

Ki-seok bowed his head politely to Yeon Baek-in’s self-mocking answer.

“Even if I go to hell, I will go there as the best in the world.”

* * *

Geommugeuk was drinking alone at the inn while waiting for Ian and Seojin to return.

Yeon Baek-jin strode towards where he was sitting and placed an old iron sword on the table.

“There is one sword that you don’t have to throw away.”

He found a usable sword in a pile of scrap metal in the iron room.

The sword dance looked up at him. It felt different than when they had parted ways earlier. He looked a little more agitated than before.

“Surely you didn’t really go back and find it?”

“I found it myself.”

“I wouldn’t have noticed even if you bought it on the way here.”

Yeon Baek-jin snorted. It was a moment that gave a glimpse into his personality.

“Why did you change your mind?”

It was because of one person’s death.

“Pyosan is dead. They say he committed suicide by hanging himself.”

Yeon Baek-jin could tell. His brother had killed him. It was the moment when his lingering suspicions turned into certainty.

“What on earth do you think I am!”

Despite the surprising news, the sword dance was calm.

“Did you expect that?”

“It’s not as expected, but it’s not surprising. They’re the ones who tried to kill even the blood relatives of the ghost. Cutting off one limb that has been revealed shouldn’t be a problem. Now, please sit down. If it’s before you eat, then do it.”

Yeon Baek-jin sat down. When I came here, I had mixed feelings and was uncertain. But when I saw the sword dance, I thought I had come to the right place. Strangely, this young man had a way of making me feel at ease.

“Let’s have a drink.”

The swordsman poured him a drink.

“One more drink.”

After downing three glasses of alcohol in quick succession, he revealed something unexpected.

“Master Lim came to see me before he died.”

The reason Yeon Baek-jin got involved in this incident was because of Im Hyeok.

“They said something strange happened inside the building.”

Yeon Baek-jin relayed exactly what Im Hyeok had said.

It was two years ago that Im Hyuk first took notice of this matter.

There was a really talented official whom I had personally taught since I was in Baekryongban two years ago. He was a friend who had both great skills and a strong desire for success.

If things had continued like this, he would have passed the Hwangryongban exam, but one day he came to see me and said goodbye, saying that he was quitting the military service. He said that he wanted to say hello to his teacher.

Lim Hyeon tried to dissuade him by saying that if he just endured a little longer, he would definitely be released, but he left, saying that he had something he absolutely had to do.

At that moment, I felt an inexplicable yearning in the eyes of the official. What could he have been trying to gain by wasting all that time he had spent suffering?

After that incident, something similar happened again this year. This time, he was an official who was guaranteed to pass the civil service exam, and I saw in him the same passion I had seen in the eyes of that official back then.

No matter how much I thought about it, it seemed strange, so I started to investigate secretly. And I found out that in the past three years, many people who could have easily passed the exam have quit.

Since it was a place where so many people went, no one paid attention to this fact. What would be the point of saying that he was quitting? He must have his own reasons.

“No matter what, I came to you because I thought it was strange. I wanted you to look into it. Honestly, when I first heard that, I didn’t think it was that strange.”

He emptied his glass again.

“Two days after he came to see me, Teacher Lim died.”

Yeon Baek-jin’s gaze, which had been directed at the empty glass, turned to Geommu-geuk.

“That was really weird.”

At that time, I was feeling that my brother, the head of the household, had changed a lot from before. He had become inexplicably sensitive and cold.

But I didn’t think he was involved in killing the teacher. Today, with Pyo-san’s death, it became clear. Hyung was also involved in Im-hyeon’s death.

“What do you mean by the place you asked about when you were questioning Pyo-san earlier?”

“I heard you right.”

He had already come to me with the intention of telling me everything.

“We secretly investigated the finances of the officer and found out that the money was being used to purchase materials needed for large-scale construction.”

That’s why I asked Pyo-san where the place was. To find out where and what kind of construction was going on.

“That’s all I know.”

“Thank you for your advice.”

Thanks to you, we finally found out why Im Hyuk lost his life. And we also got valuable information about what kind of secret construction is underway.

Yeon Baek-jin emptied his glass in silence. It was a guilt he didn’t necessarily need to feel, but Geommu-geuk could sense that he felt a little guilty about Im Hyeon’s death.

The current Yeon Baek-jin was not a villain. No matter how you looked at it, he wasn’t a villain pretending to be good.

Why would such an ordinary person take such a path? When Seo Jin took revenge, his older brother was already dead. At the time, I naturally thought Yeon Baek Jin had killed him.

Why did you, someone like me, walk the path of fate that would lead you to kill your brother and the woman you loved?

The gaze of the swordsman looked down at the iron sword that Yeon Baek-jin had brought. In any case, one thing was certain. The moment he picked up this sword, the wheel of fate would have begun to change direction slightly.

Geommugeuk slowly drew his iron sword and spoke.

“You have found the right one. This sword is destined to never melt in the fire pit again.”

* * *

The organ was descending endlessly underground.

A white man was riding alone in a place that could only accommodate one person.

He was looking at his own face reflected in the lump of metal from the engine room. It was a face that had become unfamiliar at some point.

thud.

The door of the stopped machine opened.

A man was waiting in front of him. A familiar face. He was a man from the Hwangryong Martial Arts Academy.

“Just follow me and step where I step.”

Yeonbaek-in followed him.

The floor was lined with checkerboard-like lines, each a different color.

Yeonbaek-in followed the path his guide took.

The walls were torn off here and there along the way. The complex devices visible inside were terrifying organs.

Some were already completely dismantled, while others were still intact, so stepping on the wrong floor could cost you your life.

There were places where I had to walk on a tightrope, and there were places where I had to climb up and then slide down again.

There were places where I had to crawl through small passages and swim through water. It was a maze that I could never find without a guide. I’ve been here several times in the past three years, but the path changed and I got confused every time I came.

And we arrived at the final space.

In that wide, square-like place, those who had once been officials of the Hwangryong Martial Arts Academy were working hard.

There were people who raised their swords and cut the wall, people who looked down at the drawing and wrote something diligently, and people who carried boxes.

They were not brought in. They all chose to come voluntarily.

They were being paid a huge amount of money every month, which was incomparable to the other jobs they could choose after leaving the military. It was an amount that would make everyone’s dreams come true once they finished this job.

And there he was.

The man who changed not only his own life as the Hwangryonggwanju, but also the lives of everyone here.

These were the first words the man said to her when he came to her.

-I need you to dig some ground with me.

He was a very handsome middle-aged man with a sad expression. His eyes were relaxed, and the corners of his mouth were slightly upturned with a hint of mischief.

“Watch out there!”

The man was running around barefoot, his hair tied back tightly, his upper body exposed.

The numerous scars on his body told of the kind of life he had had.

“I told you to be careful there!”

The moment a man’s shout erupts toward a young man.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

A huge chunk of iron, several times the size of a man, fell on his head.

Bam! Bam!

The white man was such a large lump of iron that I thought it would be impossible to find even a trace of his body.

Phew phew.

When the rising dust settled, everyone looked at it with surprised expressions.

A huge block of iron was split in half, and two people were standing between it.

The man stood next to the young man.

It was quite far away when I yelled, but it flew there in an instant and cut the lump of iron in half.

The cut section was so clean and smooth that it shone. Amazingly, the man cut through this large block of iron without emitting any black energy.

It wasn’t cut with a sword, though. The sword in the man’s hand was an old iron sword that could be found anywhere in the marketplace.

Not only Yeon Baek-in, but everyone there showed awe at the man’s deity. The move he showed was truly the pinnacle of swordsmanship.

The man lightly hit the young man on the back of the head.

“Are you going to die without even spending money?”

“I’m sorry. Thank you for saving my life.”

The young man bowed deeply in greeting. The other young men also expressed their gratitude. There was no one who had not been helped by this man at least once.

“Everyone, clean this up first!”

“yes!”

The young men gathered to clear the iron. They started to shred the iron by raising their swords. When they came in, most of them had not raised their swords, but now they were all skilled at raising their swords.

The man stood for a long time, even taking care of cleaning up after himself by clearing away the iron pieces, before turning to Yeon Baek-in.

“It’s been a while.”

The man walked over with a bright smile, brushing the dust off his body with his hands.

“Did anything interesting happen in the outside world?”