The Hao Clan’s Hangzhou branch.
The place was in utter chaos.
Cheongpa, whom they’d dragged in by force and locked in the underground dungeon, had disappeared.
All that remained there were bars that had been sliced clean through.
Which meant that someone with Peak-level skill had broken in and taken her away.
Bang!
“Who the hell snatched Cheongpa?!”
At the branch chief’s furious roar, everyone could only keep their mouths shut like they’d been stuffed with honey.
Just then,
“Branch Chief! Branch Chief!”
Someone rushed in, shouting urgently.
“Madam Cheongpa has appeared at Clear Wave Pavilion.”
“What? At Clear Wave Pavilion?”
“Yes. According to our informant, Madam Cheongpa was able to return thanks to Deputy Merchant Lord Eun Seo-ho, who just took over Clear Wave Pavilion.”
“So he ignored our warning in the end.”
Yeon-yeon, branch chief of the Hao Clan’s Hangzhou branch, spoke with a vicious expression.
“In that case, we’ll make him regret it, just like we warned. Scrape up every bit of information you can find on Eun Seo-ho and everyone around him.”
“Yes, Branch Chief!”
I asked Attendant Dong-a about the Hao Clan’s Hangzhou branch.
The branch chief’s name was Yeon-yeon.
He said she had started as a courtesan and climbed her way up to become a Hao Clan branch chief.
“I’ve heard she can’t rest easy until she gets whatever information she wants.”
“So you’re saying she’s persistent. And greedy on top of that.”
“Exactly. I heard she’s crazy about money. They say she’s got an uncanny eye for picking out information that’ll sell for a lot.”
Yeon-yeon, huh…
The reason I’d asked about her was because I’d never seen her in my previous life.
Which meant she was the one in charge before the branch chief I remembered took over the Hangzhou branch.
Well, that made sense.
Right about now, the branch chief I knew was probably working himself half to death under her.
According to him, his predecessor had been stabbed to death by a subordinate.
So this current branch chief, Yeon-yeon, must have piled up quite a few grudges.
“But your opponent isn’t just one person, it’s the Hao Clan’s Hangzhou branch itself. The risk is enormous.”
“That doesn’t matter. The ways they can mess with me are obvious. At best, they’ll dig into my past and try to shake me with the information they find.”
I let out a short laugh.
“But I haven’t exactly lived a sloppy life.”
Information about me?
They’re welcome to dig up as much as they want.
It won’t hurt me in the slightest.
Meanwhile, I’ll be busy in my own way, collecting payment for threatening me and laying hands on what’s mine.
They were the ones who touched my things first. Why wouldn’t I be allowed to touch theirs?
That dawn.
I left Clear Wave Pavilion.
Since the Hao Clan might come after Madam Cheongpa again, I asked Escort Guard Seo Wu to remain and guard her.
And I only brought Escort Guard Jin Yu with me.
The other Escort Guards might feel left out, so I told them I had something I needed to handle discreetly.
Thanks to the trust we’d built up, they readily agreed with my decision.
“Even from our point of view, Escort Guard Jin Yu is the perfect man for anything covert.”
“How could we ever shackle our lord’s feet?”
“Escort Guard Jin Yu, if our lord gets hurt, we’ll kill you ourselves.”
“I’ll do everything in my power.”
I recalled that exchange as I walked down the alley.
“It’s already between three and five in the morning.”
“Sure is.”
I couldn’t help letting out a sigh.
There goes my sleep for today.
Our destination was the Hao Clan’s Hangzhou branch.
Under its control were five subordinate branches, from the First Branch to the Fifth Branch.
I slowly scanned the surroundings.
There were lookouts, but with their level of skill, there was no way they’d notice us.
We slipped into the compound unnoticed, then I took out Geumryeong.
“Kui– mmph!”
I quickly covered Geumryeong’s mouth and sent a Voice Transmission.
– Keep it down!
– Kui…
– Find this branch’s vault. The place with piles of money and expensive stuff.
– Kui!
Wiggling their backside excitedly, Geumryeong led the way.
We soon saw a vault fitted with mechanical traps, with Escort Guards standing rigidly on watch in front of it.
But that didn’t matter.
– Geumryeong, you can slip inside there, right?
– Kui!
Geumryeong nodded.
– Then go in and move every last thing in there into my Hidden Vault. If you do, I’ll give you a gold tael.
At my words, Geumryeong happily darted straight into the vault. The guards in front of it never even noticed.
That was one of Geumryeong’s specialties.
No matter what was in front, as long as Geumryeong felt like it, they could just pass right through. That was why they were already fast but could move even faster when traveling like this.
A spiritual beast really was on a different level.
A short while later.
Geumryeong came out of the vault and trotted back to us.
– Did you move everything inside?
– Kui!
Then how about we go visit the other branches?
Morning came.
The Hao Clan’s Hangzhou branch was in a frenzy, trying to gather information on Eun Seo-ho.
“Hwangjo just delivered a report.”
“Let me see… he dug up quite a lot. Pay him well for his trouble.”
“Yes, Branch Chief.”
To obtain information, you had to pay a fair price.
The Hao Clan was made up of people who gathered to sell information for money.
And since they were pouring all their effort into collecting information on Eun Seo-ho, the payments they were handing out were no joke.
“Ah, the money pouch is empty. Internal Chief Administrator, refill this for me.”
“Understood.”
The Hangzhou branch’s Internal Chief Administrator headed for the vault to refill the money pouch.
He worked the mechanism and opened the vault door.
Clatter.
The moment he looked inside, he froze on the spot.
Thud.
The pouch slipped from his fingers, and his whole body began to tremble.
One of the Escort Guards, unsettled by his strange reaction, asked,
“What’s wrong, sir?”
“It’s gone…”
“What is?”
“The money’s gone! There’s not a single coin left!”
“What?”
Puzzled, they craned their necks and peered into the vault.
“W– we have to report this to the branch chief right away!”
The Internal Chief Administrator rushed to the branch chief in a panic.
“Branch Chief! We’ve got a serious problem!”
“What is it?”
“There’s no money in the vault!”
“What kind of nonsense is that? What do you mean, there’s no money in the vault?”
Branch Chief Yeon-yeon frowned deeply.
“Are you trying to make a fool out of me?”
“How could I possibly dare to joke with you, Branch Chief?”
At his earnest expression, she rose from her seat.
“Let’s go see.”
She walked with the Internal Chief Administrator to the vault and stepped inside.
“What? Isn’t the vault supposed to be somewhere around here?”
“We’re already inside the vault, Branch Chief.”
“What?”
“This room we’re in is the vault.”
“…”
Startled, Yeon-yeon looked around.
But all she saw was dust.
Every last thing was gone, not a single coin in sight.
“W– who in the world did this?!”
She was so shocked she couldn’t even form full sentences. Just then, someone called out to her.
“Branch Chief! An urgent message just came in from the First Branch. You need to go there right away.”
“…Tell them to wait.”
“We can’t. They reported that every last coin in their vault was stolen last night!”
“What? Their vault was robbed too?”
Yeon-yeon’s eyes fluttered. First, her own branch, and now even the First Branch’s vault had been cleaned out.
Then it happened again.
“Branch Chief! It’s terrible! The Second Branch’s vault has been hit!”
“Ha. Hahaha. Hahaha.”
She burst into wild laughter, sounding halfway insane.
Because the situation unfolding in front of her was simply unbelievable.
“Don’t tell me the Fifth Branch has been robbed too.”
There’s an old saying.
‘Surely not’ are the words that get you killed.
The moment she heard that even the Fifth Branch’s vault had been emptied, Yeon-yeon collapsed where she stood.
“Branch Chief!”
“Are you all right, Branch Chief?”
After barely regaining her senses, she nodded.
“I’m fine.”
She had a pretty good idea whose fault this whole mess was.
‘Eun Seo-ho! This is definitely his doing!’
She had no idea how he’d done it, but she couldn’t just sit there and take it.
She gave orders to everyone in the branch.
“Bring me every last scrap of information we’ve collected on Eun Seo-ho!”
“Yes, Branch Chief!”
To launch a counterattack, she began to dig through every piece of information on him.
It hadn’t been long since they’d started their investigation, but the branch was competent enough that they’d gathered quite a lot.
“He did get recognized as a hero by the Murim Alliance, sure. Handsome Young Hero, was it? But no matter how heroic someone looks, there’s always at least one flaw once you dig deep enough!”
Then she suddenly froze, unable to hide her confusion.
“Hold on, what’s this? Eun Seo-ho has connections with the Embroidered Guard?”
“Yes. They say he’s especially close with a high–ranking officer there named Jin Yeong.”
“…”
Biting her lip, she flipped through more pages.
Then she picked up one sheet, and her eyes almost popped out of her head.
“What? When the Ministry of Revenue tried to ‘tame’ him as a merchant, the Embroidered Guard and the Eastern Depot stepped in and pressured the Ministry of Revenue?”
“Yes. The Minister of Revenue personally came out to greet Eun Seo-ho, according to the report.”
“…”
She bit her lip again and kept digging.
“He goes to the North Sea often?”
“Yes. He founded a branch of the Eunhae Merchant Group in the North Sea and has even traveled with the North Sea Ice Palace’s young palace mistress.”
She chewed on her lip yet again.
“And what’s this now… the Emperor favors him? He’s often summoned into the Imperial Palace?”
Maybe she’d bitten her lip too hard this time. Blood began to seep out.
Her clenched fist trembled uncontrollably.
There were a lot of powers you simply didn’t mess with, but this went beyond anything reasonable.
The Emperor, who was practically the empire itself.
The Eastern Depot and the Embroidered Guard, his eyes and hands – and the bogeymen of the empire.
The North Sea Ice Palace, considered one of the strongest powers in existence.
And the Murim Alliance.
He was linked to terrifying forces across both the imperial court and the martial world. No wonder she felt like she was going insane.
“Um… Branch Chief. I think we’ve picked a fight with someone we really shouldn’t have.”
“You think I don’t know that already?!”
At that moment, the Internal Chief Administrator cautiously spoke up.
“Uh, the money we were supposed to pay out by today… what should we do about that?”
“Just pay it. Why are you bothering m…”
Yeon-yeon, who had started to snap back, suddenly shut her mouth.
Because she’d just remembered they didn’t have a single coin left in the entire Hangzhou branch.
Because of the nature of their work, the Hao Clan couldn’t deposit money at money houses. All transactions had to be done in hard cash. Depositing money meant paying fees, which would just cut into their profits.
On top of that, information about each branch’s finances might leak out.
For the same reason, they couldn’t borrow money from the money houses either. And the relationship between the Hangzhou branch and the local money houses wasn’t exactly friendly to begin with.
They couldn’t reach out to other branches for help, either.
Each Hao Clan branch operated very independently.
This wasn’t a matter of borrowing a few coins – they needed a huge sum. If they asked, the other branches would obviously investigate why.
And once they found out, they’d pull back immediately.
No one wanted to help and then get dragged into this mess.
They couldn’t turn to the Hao Clan’s Chief, either.
The Chief had always emphasized that the Hao Clan had to exist like it was there but not there.
That was the only way to ensure it lasted a long time, he’d say.
But if he found out she’d provoked Eun Seo-ho, who was tied to all the very forces you were never supposed to touch in the empire…
‘He’d have my head.’
Realizing that, Yeon-yeon’s hands began to tremble.
She needed to fix this situation quickly.
“Where is Deputy Merchant Lord… Eun Seo-ho right now?”
Clear Wave Pavilion.
I was there, listening to the total amount of damage the servers had calculated.
“So, the total comes out to about one hundred silver taels?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
Since I’d told them to double it, the actual amount was probably around fifty taels.
There were a few reasons I’d told them to count it as double.
First, compensation for the mental and emotional damage. Imagine how anxious everyone at Clear Wave Pavilion must have been, with people storming around wrecking the place they work in.
Second, the broken furniture and fixtures held the effort and memories of the servers who’d taken care of them all this time.
By smashing those things, they’d also trampled on all that care and all those memories.
“We’re going to collect every last bit of this.”
“But, Deputy Merchant Lord.”
Madam Cheongpa called out to me worriedly from beside me.
“Are you sure this is all right? The Hao Clan’s power is…”
“Information is scary, sure. But there’s something even scarier than information. Do you know what that is?”
“…?”
She tilted her head, and I answered with a grin.
“Money.”
Which was why I’d taken every last coin from the Hao Clan’s Hangzhou branch.
Just then, Palgap approached me.
“Um, Young Master. Someone from the Hao Clan says they want to meet you.”
I nodded and headed for Clear Wave Pavilion’s entrance.
A man saw me and bowed politely.
“I’ve come from the Hao Clan’s Hangzhou branch. Our branch chief wishes to meet you. I’ll escort you to our branch.”
“Tell her to come here herself.”
“Pardon?”
“I don’t have any business with her. She’s the one who needs something from me, so shouldn’t the branch chief who has business be the one to come in person?”
At my words, sweat beaded on his forehead, and he bowed his head.
“I– I’ll relay that message.”
He hurried away, and I let out a soft laugh as I watched him go.
The Hao Clan’s Hangzhou branch chief still had a long way to go before she came to her senses.
Even now, in this situation, she was trying to cling to her pride.
Did I really look that easy to her?
“If the Hao Clan’s Hangzhou branch can’t pay for information anymore, you think anyone’s going to bring them information?”
“No, they won’t. But then the people who make their living selling information will struggle. Is that really all right?”
“That’s why I’ve already got a plan. I’m going to spread a rumor around Hangzhou. I’ll buy that information instead.”
“What?”
“And in return, I’ll pay them with food.”
Right now, even if you had money, you couldn’t buy grain.
And there’s a saying: the one who feeds you is the one you see as good.
I might not be a good person, but I can pretend to be one for a while.
–TL Notes–
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