Translator: Nox

My Dad Is the Strongest Under Heaven

Chapter 28

Chapter 28

28. I Cannot Die in Vain

“Pursue him! He must be nearby.”

A dense forest along the riverside.

Numerous figures moved swiftly through the trees.

They advanced as if cornering their prey.

Hah… Hah…

Inside a cave, Peng Seojin stemmed the blood seeping from his wounds and gripped his saber once more.

His complexion was deathly pale, looking worse than ever.

A dozen bloodthirsty killers had already fallen to his blade.

It was martial prowess truly worthy of the man called the Mad Dragon and the Grand Young Master of the Hebei Peng Clan.

Yet far too many still remained.

No, at some point, their numbers even seemed to be increasing.

“Damn it, at this rate…”

Furthermore, once his resistance grew fierce, they stopped charging in recklessly.

As if aware of his injuries and waiting for their prey’s strength to drain away, they were watching for the perfect moment to lunge in and tear at his throat.

Vicious as it was, that alone was enough to tell him everything.

These men were consummate masters of murder.

Worse still was the fact that every single one of their weapons was coated in deadly poison.

The blood dripping from his calves and arms, for instance, was turning pitch-black.

They had come with the explicit intention of taking Peng Seojin’s life from the very beginning.

Perhaps it was only natural.

Though he suppressed the poison from coursing through his entire body with his inner energy, the situation would only deteriorate as time passed.

“Hah, hah…”

He had clamped his teeth down so hard against the excruciating agony that his jaw throbbed numbly.

Would he really make it back alive?

The odds were clearly stacked against him.

It was then.

Rustle, rustle.

Peng Seojin sensed through his qi perception that they were tightening the encirclement once again.

For a moment, he hesitated.

Should he break out and relocate?

Or stay here and fight?

Which was the better choice—or was there even a better choice to begin with?

With his body in its worst condition, his mind refused to turn as swiftly as usual.

In truth, he was enduring better than anyone else could have.

An ordinary man might have already lost his mind in such a dire situation.

Crunch.

Peng Seojin bit his lip until blood seeped through, desperately anchoring his fading consciousness.

‘Do not give up. I must survive. At all costs!’

He could not die such a meaningless death.

---

Whoosh!

A figure soaring at terrifying speed came to a halt atop the tallest tree in the forest.

‘What happened? I thought he would at least be near here.’

He was the Patriarch of the Hebei Peng Clan, Peng Mugang.

Though he had dispatched warriors to scour the area where the slain Peng warriors had been discovered, they had failed to find Peng Seojin.

Impatience gnawing at him, he had set out himself without telling a soul.

He had believed that he, of all people, would find his son in no time, but that had not been the case.

Where on earth was he that he remained so impossible to locate?

‘No, unless…’

Instantly, Peng Mugang’s face hardened.

Then he shook his head violently.

As if to shake off the ominous thought that had just crossed his mind.

There was no way that boy would go down so easily.

“Of course. Whose son is he, after all?”

The thought slipped from his lips unbidden.

Yet contrary to his words, the rigid tension on Peng Mugang’s face showed no sign of easing.

“I’ll have to expand my search this time.”

Peng Mugang’s body soared high into the air.

Rumble—!

His presence radiated an overwhelming aura, like that of a colossal tiger.

It was a breathtaking lightness technique truly worthy of his renowned name.

Yet somehow, his soaring figure appeared frantic beyond measure.

---

“What is the meaning of this? You should have finished him off in one stroke!”

Inside the lavish mansion known as the Golden Manor.

In its most secret chamber, a corpulent man with a greedy countenance was fuming with irritation.

Beside him, two similarly dressed men wore equally grim expressions.

This was not the outcome they had desired.

“Why are you making this so complicated! What are we supposed to do if the Grand Young Master is still breathing?!”

“It would have been ideal to eliminate him in one go as planned, of course. But our target is the Grand Young Master of the Hebei Peng Clan, one of the Five Great Clans. A man feared as the Mad Dragon, no less. His resistance was formidable.”

Even as his clients vented their overt annoyance, the masked man simply shrugged, completely unfazed.

“Frankly, we did not anticipate him holding out this long against our ambush. However, our Squad Leader has deemed it nothing more than his final death throes. Rest assured, the matter will be settled shortly.”

“Hmph. It had better be. That is, if you wish to receive the promised payment in full.”

“Do you truly think we undertook a job against one of the Five Great Clans with half-hearted resolve?”

The masked man’s eyes sharpened the moment money was mentioned.

The masters of the Golden Manor flinched beneath that ferocious glare.

All except the fat man seated at the center.

The masked man continued in a low, sunken voice.

“When we took on a job of this scale, we staked the very survival of our organization on it. And just to give you fair warning in advance: if you try any funny business…”

The masked man’s gaze swept across each of the three men seated at the round table.

“…our Squad Leader’s throwing daggers will find their way to your throats. So if you’re entertaining any clumsy tricks, you would do well to discard them quietly.”

“Hmph! Had we intended to play games with money in a matter of this magnitude, we would never have commissioned you in the first place. We are merchants—men who pursue profit. We never spare silver when it matters most!”

“Good. I like the sound of that. Then I shall return shortly with an answer that satisfies you. Until next time.”

With those parting words, his figure melted away into the floor and vanished.

A momentary silence fell over the room.

Uncertain whether the man had truly departed, they hesitated before speaking.

Soon, one of them broke the silence.

“A-Are we truly going to be all right with this, Hyung-nim?”

It was the scrawniest of the three men at the round table.

His face was etched with profound anxiety.

“What nonsense are you spouting now, of all times?”

The fat man who had led the conversation glared at his trembling, gaunt companion with an irritated scowl.

“It’s just… something feels off. Striking the Grand Young Master of the Peng Clan was uneasy enough, but failing to finish him in one blow and dragging this out only makes me more anxious.”

“Did you not just hear what he said? It will be resolved shortly.”

The other man, who had remained silent until now, spoke to reassure him.

“Indeed. The bastard is already battered and broken; how long could he possibly hold out? Besides, from what I heard, he was swept down the river and found far from where the strike occurred. Luck is on our side.”

“Still, how did they locate him?”

The scrawny man looked at the fat man with genuine curiosity.

“If he drifted so far down the river, tracking him down shouldn’t have been easy.”

His expression questioned whether such a feat was even possible.

Seeing his face, the fat man chuckled smugly.

“That is because I foresaw such contingencies and secretly bought off one of the merchants meeting with the Grand Young Master today.”

“Heh… You mean there was a traitor among them?”

He had seen those merchants before.

He remembered them all bearing honest, good-natured faces.

And yet—

“Tsk, tsk. Betrayal, you say? How can a merchant like you use such a foolish word?”

Clicking his tongue in derision, the fat man continued.

“It is only natural for any man to move where profit lies. He simply found our offer satisfying.”

“So what did you have him do?”

“I had him smear a scent on the boy—one that will never wash off for three full days.”

“Ah!”

“No matter where he hides or how far he flees, it will be useless. That means he will never survive past tonight. Heheh.”

Already wounded and exhausted, unable to receive aid from anyone, he would be relentlessly hunted by those human butchers until he was hacked to pieces.

“Bwahaha!”

The fat man burst into a hearty laugh of satisfaction.

As if he had never fumed over failing to eliminate him in a single strike.

The more he thought about it, the more certain he felt that the affair would conclude smoothly.

Besides, he had not paid such a fortune to those butchers—who would do anything for coin—for nothing.

‘I understand pursuing profit as a merchant, but it must not turn into greed. And I have no intention of idly watching such greed taint Hebei. Do you understand?’

That was what the boy had said to his face.

A brat far younger than him, daring to lecture him relying solely on the backing of his clan!

So if he could teach a lesson to that arrogant brat who obstructed their business and acted so insolent, the cost did not matter in the slightest.

“The Five Great Clans? Hmph.”

The fat man did not doubt for a moment that such factions were mere obstacles his wealth could crush at any time.

And once that high-and-mighty Grand Young Master was swept aside, they would be able to devour the entirety of Hebei’s merchant sphere.

Considering the wealth they would amass, the money spent on those butchers tonight was not wasted in the least.

At his words, the anxious, gaunt man also began to smile.

Hahaha.

Bwahahaha!

Soon, the room was filled with greedy laughter.

“Hmph. Fools.”

Having just slipped out of the grand estate, the figure paused and looked back.

“Do you think our Squad Leader will leave you bastards untouched once this job is over?”

There was a truth they remained ignorant of.

For typical mercenary organizations, fulfilling the client’s request and receiving the agreed compensation was the entirety of the transaction.

However, the Blood Poison Squad to which he belonged was different.

The moment they completed a contract and confirmed a client possessed the capacity to pay immense sums of money, they would bite off that client’s head and pillage everything they owned.

That was precisely why they were scorned by other syndicates as the most vile contract organization.

Yet it did not matter. Such was their way.

And this man was an officer of the Blood Poison Squad.

Looking at those fools who had happily come offering a fortune to assassinate the Grand Young Master of the Hebei Peng Clan, he could barely contain his laughter.

As far as he knew, the Squad Leader had already made up his mind.

“So the moment this job ends, those bastards are dead as well.”

Their swaggering arrogance would end here.

They had already gauged just how much wealth the Golden Manor possessed.

They had also finalized their plans on how to plunder it.

Even if eliminating the Grand Young Master of the Hebei Peng Clan caused trouble later, their preparations to go into hiding for a while were flawless.

“Heheh.”

The thought brought a chuckle bubbling up on its own.

“Now then, I should get moving as well.”

His body leapt into the air.

Though the distance was considerable, it posed little problem for him, possessor of the swiftest lightness technique among the Blood Poison Squad.

In the art of lightness techniques alone, he was confident he would bow to no one.

Yet in his wildest dreams, he could never have known.

That even beyond the senses of a master like him, someone had melted into his shadow, following close behind.