Chapter 178 — Night Raid
About half an hour after Deok and his party returned, some fifty riders approached.
They had clearly been sent the moment Deok's report arrived.
As Youngwoo had said, Kim Baeksu had come in person.
He rode in snorting with anger, and he still looked half-drunk.
"Oh. It really is Kim Baeksu."
Cheolun looked dumbfounded and gestured with his hand.
"What on earth was that matter you mentioned?"
"What else could it be? He is a man who has committed many sins. Point at anything, and something will catch."
Cheolun blinked, then thrust his face forward as if pouncing.
"Wait, so that was just a bluff?"
"There are a few things, but nothing specific. Would his heart be at ease when someone speaks of sins even he himself does not know?"
"Ha. That is impressive psychological warfare."
"It is not even psychology. Why did I leave that fellow out back then? If I had said a few words, I could have had him caught when they were all taken in."
"When things get difficult, he bows his head and slips out well. He is a rat of a bastard."
"That is true. Still, he came in a hurry. He has only words. In truth, he has almost no martial skill or military strength. A man who is good at nothing had to keep that post somehow. What else would he have done? He must have offered things upward again and again. Someone said he was Yi Huisong's money line."
"Money line?"
"They say if you shake him, money falls out."
"Is that really true?"
"How would I know? I heard it, so I know it as something people say."
Cheolun tilted his head.
"They said the Kwon fellow did that. They called him a funding line."
"That one lives for the pleasure of skimming here and there. He twists and turns the state budget, pulls money out, then sends it upward. But do you think he only sent it upward? They say he bought a mansion in Gaegyeong. They say he has a villa somewhere too. While saying he is offering it up, he sets aside a portion for himself, and apparently that portion is enormous."
"Ah, why do people live like that?"
"A post is a source of money. Those above are pleased and do not make it a problem, so he skims from every place and sends it upward. They say he goes to the money house twice a day."
"Why?"
"To deposit what he skimmed under Yi Huisong's name, and then secretly deposit another portion under his own name, or so they say."
"Really?"
"I only heard it."
Cheolun accepted it.
"That sounds right. He went to the West Gate Market almost every day. I also heard that he gathered, little by little, what should have gone to the soldiers."
"That is the Kwon fellow. I have not heard what happened to him."
"He is probably alive somewhere. He is immortal."
"Are you going to keep talking like this?"
"Ah. They are coming."
"Go and prepare to set things off."
"Loyalty!"
Youngwoo mounted his horse and rode forward.
In the dim darkness, dozens of riders could be seen.
No, that was not all.
Behind them, more than a hundred armored infantry were marching.
Truly, men who knew nothing were commanding troops.
There was no way strategy existed inside the heads of men who barely maintained discipline through collective punishment.
Youngwoo looked back.
He was always worried about his rear.
Now Cheolun was the only one behind him, so he was worried.
Would the fellow do well?
Still, this was better than before.
At Seonchullyeong, he had been worried about betrayal from the Goryeo troops behind him.
No matter how well he fought, things could not go well.
He had felt more at ease when he was among the Jin army.
There had been many things to watch and many orders to give, but he had not needed to imagine that they would endanger him.
"Woo-oo-oi!"
Youngwoo shouted, and the approaching cavalry stopped their horses.
There were not many riders.
Barely twenty.
Of all those horses they used to have, few remained.
Some bastard must have sold them off again.
When he listened closely, he felt the heavy motion of the armored infantry marching far behind as a tremor in the ground.
He had heard that, no matter how far away they were, one could feel such things as vibrations through the earth.
Now Youngwoo himself could do it.
Within that vibration came their number, strength, and even their mood.
It was said that one could even sense the internal power of a man approaching from far away to spar.
No matter how many of them there were, Youngwoo did not think they would be very difficult.
They felt weak.
He loosened the banner tied to the spear shaft.
The flag fluttered in the wind with a sharp, flapping sound.
"Woo-oo-oi! What is this about?"
He asked shamelessly, though he knew everything.
The man at the front came forward.
"You were camping here?"
"Yes. Why?"
"We would like you to die here."
He was blunt.
Kim Baeksu must have ordered him to say it.
"Did Kim Baeksu tell you that?"
Baeksu was right beside them, so the man could not speak of him directly.
"A report came in that you are a spy of an enemy state."
"The bastard beside you is a traitor to the state."
Baeksu turned his head and smacked his lips.
Youngwoo spoke without pause.
"Shall I tell you about a man whose life was ruined because he did what that bastard said?"
The lead rider slowly approached.
"Stop saying useless things and just offer your neck."
As he narrowed the distance, the twenty or so riders silently spread out and began to surround Youngwoo.
Youngwoo laughed faintly.
Once surrounded, he could not use his strength freely.
Then the fellow drew his sword.
"Strike!"
There was no explanation before or after.
They had clearly been ordered to kill him.
Just as the horse of the man swinging his sword leapt forward, Youngwoo thrust the banner spear straight out.
The neck of the oncoming man seemed to swell enormously in his sight.
In a moment that felt as though time had stopped, the banner spear pierced the man's throat.
The men behind him tried to spread out and complete the encirclement.
Youngwoo did not retreat.
Instead, he charged forward.
The banner snapped with a flapping cry as it struck down the man in front.
With the force of his charge added to the thrust, the man collapsed helplessly.
The riders spreading left and right turned their horses to surround him, but Youngwoo had already run through to their rear.
Kim Baeksu was there.
He shouted,
"Kill that bastard!"
Two men charged from the left and right.
These fellows had never fought mounted combat.
They were infantrymen on horses.
They had numbers, but no idea what to do, so whoever felt bold rushed first.
And even while charging as cavalry, they had drawn only short hwan-do swords.
Youngwoo's banner spear, more than three times a man's height, spun with the sound of wind.
One of the attackers blocked with his hwan-do, but the force of the banner spear drove him off his horse.
Youngwoo extended the butt of the spear backward toward the man approaching from behind.
It struck him in the stomach, and he fell from the saddle.