A flickering campfire.
The shadows seemed to sway and dance.
Sparks crackled between the charred pieces of wood.
Two days had passed since they left Shaolin, traveling southwest without pause.
Only after reaching a secluded, deserted hermitage in a remote mountain valley could they finally stop and rest.
They were roasting a skinned pheasant on a wooden skewer. Having not eaten for a while, Sama-yeong couldn't take her eyes off the sizzling meat.
"You've endured a lot."
It was the first time in two days that her father-in-law had spoken.
When they left Shaolin, he had said he urgently needed to head somewhere — this hermitage was that place.
Although it looked like a simple hermitage, getting here required passing through several barriers set up in different directions. Her father-in-law had navigated them as if reading a map.
Upon arrival, he had been visibly disappointed to find the hermitage empty.
She had been wondering why.
"This place is a hidden safehouse that Dugong and I secured together."
"Dugong?"
Dugong referred to Manbakja, one of the Eight Great Masters.
Come to think of it, even though her father-in-law had been given the title of villain, he had mentioned maintaining a connection with him.
"But why come here?"
"I was supposed to meet Dugong here."
"You mean, with Manbakja himself?"
"Yes."
Her father-in-law gazed into the burning fire with a sigh.
Then he turned to look at Sama-yeong, his expression full of deep bitterness.
Why did he say he was meeting Manbakja and then look at his daughter like that?
While Sama-yeong silently looked on, her father-in-law spoke again.
"I've finally found him."
Sama-yeong looked up at him in shock.
Her pupils trembled as if an earthquake had struck her soul.
"Is… is that true?"
"Yes."
Him?
Who is he talking about?
As I puzzled over it, he turned to me and spoke.
"...I was planning to explain everything once it was all over. But because of me, you and Yeong could be in danger, so I must speak now."
"Father-in-law..."
He had been injured when he first came to Shaolin.
To hurt a man ranked among the top five martial artists in the entire realm — whoever did it had to be an unimaginably dangerous figure.
"If it's too painful to talk about, you can tell us later..."
"You're my son-in-law now, which makes you family."
He had finally fully accepted me.
I felt a lump form in my throat.
As he added dry twigs to the fire, he continued.
"...Around the time Yeong turned one, I was the highly promising heir to the Sama Clan."
That was a well-known tale.
Though now known as one of the Five Great Villains, the incident that gave rise to his infamous reputation happened back then.
It all began with the 80th birthday celebration of the Sama Clan's Grand Elder.
That day, hundreds of guests from major orthodox sects who had come to the Sama estate were massacred.
The few survivors all pointed to Sama Chak, the clan's heir — my father-in-law — as the perpetrator.
Outraged, the martial world turned against the Sama Clan.
The then-current clan head, Sama Jong — his father — cast him out of the clan registry, offering his life in exchange for peace.
"...From that moment on, I was pursued not just by the Sama Clan, but by martial artists from all over."
That matched what I had heard.
According to common belief, he later slaughtered even his pursuers, gaining the title of villain.
But what was the real story?
Just then, Sama-yeong bit her lip and, with a flushed face, spoke.
"Father wasn't even at the banquet that day... I was terribly ill, and he left to find a physician."
"...That's right."
He wasn't even there?
Then there must have been a real culprit!
Her father-in-law continued.
"Seeing my wife and Yeong suffer as we fled the relentless net cast over us, I made a decision. I would wait for my father — the current clan head."
The Sama Clan had been the most zealous in pursuing him, determined to clear their name.
Naturally, they arrived first.
"I met with my father. I swore that if I couldn't uncover the real killer within two weeks, I would take my own life to wash away the shame on our clan."
"Ah…"
He had been willing to take full responsibility.
"I also asked one thing of him — no matter the outcome, don't cast out my wife and child."
Tears streamed down Sama-yeong's cheeks.
Her father had tried to protect her and her mother by offering his own life.
"I went to Hanjeong Lake's Full Moon Pavilion, the scene of the incident, retraced every event, examined the wounds on the dead, and tried to find the real culprit."
But the real perpetrator was cunning.
Everyone connected to the Full Moon Pavilion was already dead, and the corpses of the victims had all been cremated.
No evidence remained.
"In the end… I chose to give my life for my wife and child."
After two fruitless weeks, he returned to the search party.
What he saw shocked him to the core.
Every martial artist in the search party had been slaughtered.
Even his father, Sama Jong, had been dismembered and killed.
He had wept bitterly over his father's death.
But amid the tears, only two people came to mind.
"...I had to find Yeong and my wife."
He searched the mutilated corpses.
Most of them were too damaged to recognize — he had to check them one by one.
As he searched, the second wave of the search party arrived and misunderstood the scene.
"No matter how I denied it, they wouldn't believe me."
All the wounds on the corpses matched the sword techniques of the Sama Clan.
They were so precise, it was almost like his own swordsmanship — said to be the greatest in clan history.
The martial artists tried to capture him.
"But I couldn't allow myself to be caught. Not until I confirmed my wife and child's fate."
He fought them for two nights and days.
But he never killed them.
He believed that if he did, it would mean giving in to the will of whoever had framed him.
Instead, he knocked them out one by one, wandering the valley near the search party's camp in search of his loved ones.
Maybe heaven took pity on him — he heard a woman's scream from a valley three ri away.
-Crack!
His story paused as he clenched his jaw.
His eyes, flushed red with sorrow and rage, trembled.
After a moment of silence, he continued.
"I followed the valley downstream... and found a group of martial artists at the water's edge."
And there, he saw a sight he could never erase.
Those men were violating his wife.
Overcome with rage, he slaughtered them all on the spot.
-Drip, drip!
Blood dripped from his clenched fists.
Sama-yeong sobbed uncontrollably.
-Bang! Bang!
She too, overwhelmed with grief and fury, slammed her fists against the ground.
Their deep sorrow and resentment were so powerful, even I felt a lump in my throat.
"My wife... her body, violated and disgraced, was cold as ice."
Her entire body was swollen and wrinkled.
It turned out there was a small cave passage under the stream, and to protect infant Sama-yeong, her mother had held her up in the water for two days and nights.
Though she used her internal energy to shield her daughter's pulse, her own strength had faded.
As she finally emerged from the cave — utterly exhausted — she ran into the second wave of the search party.
"Ugh... Mother..."
In the end, Sama-yeong couldn't hold back her sobs.
As someone grasped her hand tightly, she buried herself in their embrace and wailed loudly.
At the sight of her, a single tear rolled down her father-in-law's cheek.
'Ah...'
It was a tear of blood.
There had always been legends of blood tears being shed by those in deep rage, but this was the first time seeing it with one's own eyes.
The father-in-law, who shed a drop of blood tear, continued speaking.
"To save Yeong, my wife used up all her internal energy and was dying. I tried to save her, even if it meant exhausting all of my energy."
But it was already too late.
She had endured for two days and nights in the cold cave water of the valley.
Having depleted her life force, survival was impossible.
"In the end... my wife breathed her last."
After losing his wife, the father-in-law cried as though the world was ending.
Having lost both his father and now his wife, he said he had lost the will to live.
"I wanted to take my own life on the spot."
Just then, baby Sama-yeong cried.
Seeing the infant wailing, he embraced the child and cried along.
Had he not cried, he might have lost his sanity altogether.
While he was crying, martial artists from the righteous sects heard the sound and appeared.
Despite seeing the grieving man and child, they saw it as an opportunity and attacked together.
"At that moment, I made up my mind. If this is what they want, then I will become a villain."
He killed them all.
Then, he hunted down every last pursuer and eliminated them.
After killing all who chased him, he went to their respective sects and destroyed them one by one.
'Ahhh...'
This was how his father-in-law became known as a villain.
Listening to this, my heart felt heavy.
Had I been in his position, I, too, might have wanted to overturn the whole world.
Can we really call him a villain?
"Father…"
Sama-yeong, who was in my arms, went over to him and hugged him.
He gently stroked her head and said,
"There is something I haven't told you."
"Yes?"
"Before your mother passed, she told me something. That someone with a golden eye in one side had attacked the camp alone."
'!!!'
A man with one golden eye.
It was him—Jonju.
'...That man again.'
Just how much has he done?
Isn't it that all the reasons why the father-in-law was labeled a villain trace back to that man?
He continued speaking to Sama-yeong.
"Your grandfather released your mother and you, and helped you escape. I didn't know how she survived back then, but now I think I understand."
"What do you mean?"
"For some reason, that man seemed to avoid water."
'Ah!'
So the father-in-law must have met him.
Otherwise, he wouldn't have known about the weakness caused by the "Golden Body Modification" procedure.
I asked him,
"So all this time, you've been trying to find the real culprit?"
"...Yes."
He had lost everything because of that man.
Of course, he wanted to capture Jonju.
'Emperor Geumsang...'
For the first time, I felt regret.
Maybe I should have just killed him back then, regardless of what happened later?
If I had, perhaps Sama-yeong wouldn't have lost her mother?
But I can't be sure.
Even the smallest change can cause massive ripple effects in the future—I was experiencing that firsthand.
"How did you find that man?"
Jonju was always extremely cautious.
Unless it was a sure thing, he never revealed himself.
There had to be something that drew him out…
"I saw someone with not just one, but both eyes golden. I believed he had some connection to that man."
"Ah! The one we saw at Bongnim Valley."
Sama-yeong remembered him.
Come to think of it, her father-in-law had been surprised by that man and chased after him.
So, all this time, he had been tracking that person's traces.
Who really is this man with both golden eyes?
He even held an official post beside the Geumsang Emperor. What could be his true goal?
"Dugong called him Seobok."
"Seobok?"
I frowned.
Could it be that Seobok I know of?
—Who's that?
A figure mentioned in a few historical records, usually in passing.
His given name was Gunbang (君房). A famed alchemist of the Qin dynasty.
Under orders from the First Emperor of Qin, he took thousands of boys and girls in search of the elixir of immortality and vanished.
"Did he really call him Seobok?"
"Yes. Judging by how even that man used the name, he could really be Seobok."
His tone was skeptical.
But I wasn't.
If he really was Seobok, then he had lived since the fall of the Qin Dynasty.
In the heavenly vision I saw through the Blood Demon Sword, he had asked the great craftsman Gu Yaja to forge the Five Cursed Swords.
Gu Yaja lived during the Warring States period through to Qin's unification.
That would mean Seobok truly found a way to become immortal.
'Immortality... Ah!'
Even the Geumsang Emperor desired it.
When I met him, he was strong but didn't seem to have undergone the Golden Body procedure yet—his eyes were normal.
So did Seobok perform that procedure on him?
—If so, then it's incredible. He actually got what he wanted.
As Sodamgeom said, it seems the emperor and his associates gained long life through Seobok's knowledge.
But why would Seobok be imprisoned in Bongnim Valley?
He was the one who gave them immortality.
That's the mystery.
"Did Seobok ever mention the man with the golden eye?"
"No. All he said was to escape into the valley waters."
If he said that, then Seobok knew the Golden Body's weakness.
Could that be why he was imprisoned?
When I last saw him, Seobok served the emperor.
Not only did he hold a position in the court, he granted the emperor immortality. So why was he locked up?
I had to hear what happened next.
"So… did you get injured while fighting that man?"
At my question, his face darkened ominously.
He had surpassed even the peak of martial mastery.
So he could assess the true level of the current emperor.
"Yes."
"You're saying that man hurt you, Father?"
Sama-yeong asked, unable to comprehend.
To her, her father was the greatest martial artist in the world.
Accepting that he lost to someone was hard for her.
But what he said next was shocking.
"He was stronger than me. Dugong and Seobok helped, and only then could we barely stand against him. His martial prowess was monstrous."
Even her father-in-law couldn't match him.
He hadn't wasted the centuries—surely he grew stronger to avenge what I did to him.
To have survived such a foe, I was fortunate.
"He fought as if he knew every martial art in existence and had inner power beyond reason."
Of course.
Even back then, he had already surpassed human limits.
Now, he had centuries of experience and immortality on top of that.
And with his golden eyes able to read opponents' energy, there was no greater monster.
"Then, Father… did you jump into the valley waters to escape?"
At that, he sighed deeply.
"No. Seobok said that if we could somehow lure him into the water, there was a chance he could be killed. So I drew him to the valley."
He hadn't fled.
Of course—this was his lifelong enemy.
No matter how strong, he wouldn't have run.
"So what happened?"
"I lured him to the cliff by the valley. But he said something strange, as if he already knew he would be led there."
"He knew?"
"Yes. He provoked me instead."
"What did he say?"
The father-in-law recalled his words, clearly annoyed.
"'Worak Sword… It was I who made you into the ultimate villain. Don't you want revenge on the world that made you this way? If so, take my hand. I'll give you both blood revenge and immortality.' …He said that."
"Ha!"
Sama-yeong was dumbfounded.
Of course she was angry—this was the man who caused her mother's death.
"To kill him, I brought the cliff down. When he tried to escape, even with half his body gone, Seobok grabbed him."
—Ugh...
Given his unnatural regeneration, it was believable.
Even a missing arm grew back instantly.
"Knowing we couldn't miss this chance, Dugong, Seobok, and I held him and leapt into the valley."
"And then?"
Sama-yeong was anxious to know.
He exhaled deeply.
"What went wrong?"
"Back then…"
Before he could answer, I spoke first.
"Did a silver-haired woman appear?"
His face twisted in surprise.
"How do you know that?"
"Because of the icy energy that had penetrated to your very bones."
So she was still alive.
Seolbaek of the Northern Ice Palace—once hailed as one of the Twelve Supreme Masters.
No martial artist today could wield such cold energy.
The father-in-law stared at me, puzzled by my knowledge.
"She struck my back before we were swept away. I countered and pushed her back, but the cold entered my body. As I fell into the water, I lost my grip on the golden-eyed man."
"What about the others?"
Sama-yeong asked.
He shook his head bitterly.
"I tried to find them while being carried downstream, but the internal injuries and cold forced me to focus on healing."
He desperately tried to recover.
But the cold had already reached his organs and marrow.
Meanwhile, masked men—likely that man's subordinates—attacked, forcing him to flee.
"I barely handled them, but my energy was running out. So I made a difficult decision…"
"You went to Shaolin."
"Yes."
Though a righteous sect, Shaolin was isolated from worldly affairs.
And it was the only place that would treat him even as a villain.
He chose that to survive.
Sama-yeong, in tears, said,
"While Father suffered alone… I didn't even know…"
"Just knowing you're safe lifts a burden off me."
"But still…"
"I told you—it's okay."
He wiped her tears with his sleeve.
Then he turned to me.
"I haven't asked until now, but that female master—I've never seen her before. How do you know her?"
Sama-yeong also looked at me, confused.
I inhaled deeply, then exhaled.
If he was this deeply involved, I needed to tell him the truth.
"...Her name is Seolbaek. Around 300 years ago, she was one of the Twelve Supreme Masters—equivalent to today's Four Great Evils or the Eight Masters."
His eyes narrowed.
I continued,
"She's from the Northern Ice Palace and serves the golden-eyed man your Excellency tried to capture. Honestly, I didn't think she was still alive."
"You speak as if you met this 300-year-old master yourself."
"I did."
"What?"
I couldn't reveal what happened during that meeting.
So I changed the topic.
"The one-eyed man you seek—he is Jonju. Three hundred years ago, he tried to destroy and purge the martial world."
"No way…"
"Yes. He was the worst tyrant—Emperor Geumsang."
'!!!'
Both father-in-law and Sama-yeong were utterly shocked.
Who would've thought?
That the golden-eyed man was an emperor from 300 years ago?
After a moment, the father-in-law, still shocked, asked,
"...How do you know this?"
I hesitated briefly, then answered honestly.
"Three hundred years ago—I defeated him."
'!?'
They both looked at me like I was speaking nonsense.