“Two bowls of plain noodles, coming right up!”

With a wandering shout, two bowls of noodles were set down on the desk.

Despite the steam rising in soft curls, the noodles themselves were strangely swollen, like they’d been boiled ahead of time and left sitting.

DRIP. DRIP.

When I lifted them with my chopsticks, the strands snapped off, one after another.

“......”

I narrowed one eye at the sight, but I didn’t care. I hadn’t come here for the flavor in the first place.

“SLURRRRP!”

Meanwhile, the bastard across from me was already shoveling it down like it was the best thing he’d ever eaten.

“Ahhh...! Nice.”

After tearing through the noodles for a while, Baek Cheonin finally finished and—

BANG!

—slammed the bowl down.

“Now I can breathe again.”

“......You that hungry?”

He ate like he’d been starved all day. He was enjoying it so much I tried another bite myself, but—

‘...What the hell is this?’

The noodles still tasted like nothing. It was honestly impressive he could eat them like that.

“Haaah!”

He let out a satisfied breath. Even then, I’d barely taken a few bites.

“Sungyeon. Looks like you don’t have much appetite?”

“......No....”

The truth was, I wasn’t hungry. But also, it tasted so bad I couldn’t keep eating.

“Then can I eat yours?”

“Y-Yeah. Go ahead.”

The instant I gave permission, Baek Cheonin went insane on the noodles.

I waited a bit, watching him—

“Haaah.”

“......”

He wiped them out even faster than before.

“Ah, that’s good.”

Right when I was starting to find the way he patted his belly kind of funny—

“Oh, right. Sungyeon.”

“What.”

“Well... is Young Lord Cheon doing okay?”

“.......”

The second he asked about Young Lord Cheon, my face tightened.

“Ah—sorry. I didn’t even get to say it before I left. It’s been bugging me.”

Then, out of nowhere, he stuck his hand out.

“It’s my first time ever stabbing someone in the belly, so my hand’s still shaking.... I can’t believe I did something like that.”

TREMBLE. TREMBLE. TREMBLE.

Just like he said, his fingertips were shaking like crazy.

And his expression—

‘That’s a face full of guilt.’

Like he couldn’t believe he’d done it, like he felt an enormous guilt toward Cheon Eujin.

‘If I didn’t know, I would’ve fallen for it too.’

If Yoo Cheongil hadn’t said anything.

Or—

‘If I hadn’t felt those auras.’

The malevolent aura I felt from Baek Cheonin. If I hadn’t felt that, this acting would’ve fooled me clean.

‘What’s your angle.’

Trying to figure that out, I looked at him and answered.

“Don’t worry. It only grazed something vital, so it shouldn’t be a problem.”

Cheon Eujin had awakened in the middle of the match.

He’d only awakened Moon Eyes, and it wasn’t clear if his realm had risen, but—

‘Cheon Eujin isn’t weak to begin with.’

It’s just that everyone around him is a monster. Cheon Eujin himself is strong.

At minimum, first-rate.

Even among the junior generation, he was on the stronger end.

You could tell just by the fact he’d made it this far.

“Then that’s a relief....”

Baek Cheonin replied with an awkward little smile.

“Go see him later. He’ll be discharged before long anyway.”

“Oh. Good. I’ll definitely go later and apologize properly.”

“......Apologize.”

Hearing that, I gave a faint smile and said—

“Sure. Apologize.”

Not like I believed he would.

“Now, that aside.”

He spoke like he was changing the topic.

“So. What was it you wanted to see me for?”

“See you? Ahh. Right.”

Baek Cheonin reacted like he’d forgotten.

Did he really forget?

I couldn’t know that far. But I didn’t think so.

“It’s nothing. I was just worried about Young Lord Cheon.”

“Then go to Cheon Eujin directly. Why me?”

“Ahaha.... Turns out the medical station isn’t a place you can just go in and out of.”

“Hm. Is that so? Didn’t know.”

A string of hollow back-and-forth.

Words with no roots, bouncing around. Could you even call this a conversation?

He asked how the noodles were. What I thought of the martial tournament.

And I answered briefly.

We went in circles like that a few times, and then—

“Sungyeon.”

Baek Cheonin’s voice shifted, almost imperceptibly.

“What?”

“What’s your goal?”

“......Goal?”

“Yeah. Goal.”

A goal? It came out of nowhere.

‘Goal....’

[What are you hesitating for?]

“.......”

Yoo Cheongil pressed in. His voice was clearly trying to shove me forward.

[You have something you want, don’t you?]

The goal Yoo Cheongil meant—

‘The strongest under heaven.’

The strongest in the Central Plains. What Yoo Cheongil had told me.

That I needed to become the strongest under heaven first.

But—

‘Not sure.’

Could I really call that my goal?

If I had to pick something closer to it—

“Just eating well and living well.”

“......Huh?”

Baek Cheonin’s expression changed in a strange way.

“Are you messing with me?”

A hint of irritation. What a joke.

“Who’s messing with you. You asked, so I answered.”

Do you have any idea how hard it is to eat well and live well?

‘How many people are out there grinding their teeth because they can’t.’

Me included. In my past life, I suffered like a dog because I couldn’t live that way.

‘This ◆ Nоvеlіgһt ◆ (Only on Nоvеlіgһt) life’s kind of screwed too, honestly.’

But I was still trying to live better than before.

“......You’re serious.”

Baek Cheonin repeated it with that same strange expression.

Watching him, I asked this time.

“And you? What’s your goal?”

What the hell was Baek Cheonin’s goal?

“Me? I...”

Right as Baek Cheonin was about to answer—

-Young Lord Bang.

“Hm?”

A voice transmission came through.

-Something happened.

It was the Commander of the Guards. He’d said he’d step away for a moment since I was eating with Baek Cheonin, and now—

‘Something? Out of nowhere?’

Voice transmission, suddenly. What the hell?

While I was still reacting—

-At the inn right now—

“......!”

At the next words, I sprang up.

“Hey.”

“Sungyeon?”

Baek Cheonin looked at me, confused.

I spoke while looking at him.

“Sorry. Something urgent came up. Let’s talk later.”

“Huh?”

I left Baek Cheonin behind and launched myself into motion.

I had to get back to the Wicheon Inn.

*****

Right after Bang Sungyeon left—

“.......”

Baek Cheonin turned his face toward the direction Bang Sungyeon had disappeared.

He wasn’t smiling.

He wasn’t frowning either.

A face locked into absolute blankness.

While he wore an expression that could’ve been thinking anything—

-Young Cult Leader.

“Yeah.”

At Sangyeon’s address, Baek Cheonin answered.

-The matter you spoke of is currently in progress. In addition, a leader-rank figure is attached to the Little Sword Saint, so approaching him is... an unavoidable difficulty.

Hearing that, Baek Cheonin nodded.

“You don’t need to approach the Little Sword Saint anymore. Just handle the task I gave you.”

-Yes, sir!

Sangyeon, having observed proper form, erased his presence and vanished.

Once he was gone, Baek Cheonin slowly crossed his legs.

Then he propped his chin up and rolled his eyes around.

Every time he did, eyes that were about to redden returned to their original color.

“Eating well and living well, huh....”

The goal he’d heard.

Thinking of it, Baek Cheonin smiled faintly.

He’d only tried to chat to kill time—

‘But he really isn’t an easy one.’

The more they spoke, the more he felt it.

How many snakes was he raising inside himself?

That bastard never let his true inside show.

The longer the conversation went, the more it made you lose the thread.

The more it kept you from reaching the destination you wanted.

‘Annoying bastard.’

So he really wasn’t someone you could handle easily.

His words were that stubborn—

‘For a second, I almost believed even that.’

Even the thing he spat out as his “goal,” for a moment I almost believed it.

Ridiculous.

‘There’s no way.’

The Little Sword Saint, called the Sword Saint’s successor—his goal is just eating well and living well?

That’s nonsense.

If he’d said he wanted to be the strongest under heaven, it would’ve been easier to believe.

‘Was even that calculation?’

He knew Bang Sungyeon was sensing something off about him.

So was that why he answered like that?

Something so petty it barely even counted as an answer.

“Arrogant.”

If he was going to act that insolent with him right in front of his face—

“I’ll teach you.”

Who he was.

If he told him, that would be that.

*****

TAP TAP TAP—!

I sprinted on quick steps.

It wasn’t far, but I ran as hard as I could anyway, and before long I reached the Wicheon Inn.

CREEEAK—!!

The moment I shoved the door open and went in—

The first thing I felt was a faint stench of blood.

“What....”

Before I could even finish frowning at the metallic smell, what was happening straight ahead jumped into view.

“This....”

“T-That...!”

Everyone was staring in one direction, panicked.

What the hell happened?

The answer was simple.

‘That crazy bastard—what the hell is he doing?’

SHNK.

A young man pulled his sword out of someone collapsed on the floor.

Around him, two martial artists were down.

Blood was running from both their throats.

They didn’t move at all.

Already dead.

Only the slow spread of blood deepened the viciousness of the scene.

“The Little Azure Sword killed people.”

“......What—why all of a sudden—!”

The one holding the sword—

incredibly—

was the Little Azure Sword.

He stood there holding the blade, his eyes slack, like something had come loose inside him.

And with my eyes gone cold, I looked at him—no, more precisely, at what was behind him.

‘How are there malicious ghosts....’

Women who died because of what the Little Azure Sword did, becoming malicious ghosts.

They weren’t in great shape to begin with, but—

‘They weren’t like that.’

Low-tier.

By classification, they would’ve been the lowest tier of malicious ghosts—

but now...

‘Mid-tier.’

Malicious ghosts at a level that must be exorcised.

At that point, they could do real damage to living humans.

‘How’d they end up like that?’

A malicious ghost’s danger increasing wasn’t strange in itself, but—

for it to change that fast...

That was the first time I’d ever seen it.

Even this situation didn’t make sense, but once you saw the malicious ghosts, you could guess.

It was obvious.

‘He got possessed.’

An act committed while possessed by malicious ghosts.

At the level of mid-tier malicious ghosts, possessing a human and making them do something stupid was nothing.

But—

‘Still. This is weird.’

No matter what, it was weird. The malicious ghosts reacted like this all of a sudden?

‘They were never that level.’

That’s why I hadn’t paid special attention before.

While I stared at the Little Azure Sword with baffled eyes—

“Ah—. Aah....”

He opened his mouth.

“Ahaha.... Ahahahaha....”

The more he laughed, the more the malicious ghosts behind him tightened around his neck.

This is bad.

At this point, it would be weird if something didn’t happen.

No—something already happened.

‘Unbelievable.’

I narrowed my eyes and watched him.

Then—

“Pathetic Orthodox dogs.”

The Little Azure Sword spoke with a hollow gaze.

“Unlucky fools, soaked in peace, knowing nothing.”

GRRRK.

His voice grated so badly it barely even carried.

Then— 𝐟𝗿𝐞𝚎𝚠𝐞𝚋𝕟𝐨𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝕔𝕠𝚖

DRIP. DRIP. DRIP.

The Little Azure Sword wept tears of blood and said—

“Soon, the Heaven of our cult will revive and swallow you all...!”

A dry, worn-out howl filled the inside of the inn.

At those words, everyone inside froze stiff.