Translator: bjgoofy

“Ryong, you lead the way toward the direction the bats flew.”

“Yes, Father.”

As soon as my foster father confirmed that the bats had flown up, he gave me instructions.

He told me to lead the group from the front.

Of course, since it was a jungle and someone was needed to clear the path, he assigned warriors from the Beast Palace to accompany me.

“Have a few members of the Fierce Wolf Squad go ahead and clear the way in the direction Soryong is moving.”

“Yes, Palace Head!”

“It was over that way.”

“Understood, Young Master Soryong. Let’s go!”

“Yes!”

Following my foster father's words, I went to the very front of the group and gave directions, and the warriors from the Beast Palace ran ahead and began clearing the path through the jungle vegetation with their large machetes.

-Slash! Slash!

As the tall jungle plants and vines were cut down and a path opened, Grandfather Man of Ten Thousand Poisons and the Tang Family warriors immediately followed behind.

“We’ll follow Soryong too!”

“Yes, Grand Elder!”

In that way, leading the group along the northern slope of Nannuo Mountain toward the presumed direction the bats had flown, we advanced.

Occasionally, I flew into the sky with Cho to confirm the direction.

“There’s a cliff ahead, so let’s turn to the right and go down.”

“Yes, Young Master Soryong!”

“Ryong, Father says it's getting dark, but once we reach the cave entrance, we'll rest there, so hurry."

“Understood, Seol noona.”

While I was giving directions at the front, the sun was setting, and Seol noona conveyed my foster father’s decision that we should camp after reaching the destination.

It was certainly better to use a cave than to be soaked by the evening dew.

Replying to Seol noona, I urged the warriors ahead.

“We’ll move a bit faster.”

“Yes! Young Master Soryong!”

-Slash! Slash!

The warriors swung their arms faster than before, and the dense jungle began to open up more quickly.

We continued on for quite some time.

It was about the time we should have already arrived, but the cave that my foster father had anticipated had not yet been found.

The sun had already set, making it impossible to dispatch people for a search.

"It should definitely be around here?"

-Tsurur!

Cho, who was following me from the side, also confirmed that this was the place, but the cave did not appear.

I flew up again into the sky, using Cat's Dark Night Technique, and tried to confirm it, but the difference between what I saw from afar and what I saw upon arrival made it impossible to pinpoint the exact location.

“I’m certain it’s around here, but it’s too dark to confirm.”

As I turned to Hua-eun and Seol noona, who were right behind me, and spoke with a troubled expression, Seol noona nodded as if she understood and gave an order to the Beast Palace warriors.

"I'll search from here. Release the Fierce Wolf Squad's wolves."

“Yes, Elder!”

At Noona’s words, several wolves brought by the Beast Palace warriors scattered in all directions, and soon after.

-Awoooo!

A wolf’s howl echoed from one part of the jungle.

“It seems to be that way!”

It seemed the wolf’s howl signaled that it had found something.

We changed direction toward the sound of the wolf’s howl, and after pushing through the jungle for a short while.

There, in front of a wolf howling toward the sky in the darkness, we found what my foster father had spoken of, not exactly a cave, but what used to be a cave.

“Ryong, I think this is the place?”

“Hmm... It does seem like the place, but using the cave might be difficult.”

The reason I thought it was what used to be a cave was because the large cave entrance was completely blocked by fallen rocks and stones.

The cave entrance was tightly sealed with collapsed rocks, and vines growing in between them had further reinforced the blockage, leaving the entrance completely sealed off.

Seol noona used Qinggong to check above the collapsed rocks and reported that while there was space for bats to pass through, it would be difficult for a person to crawl through.

“There is space, but I don’t think a person can crawl in.”

Then, after thinking for a moment, my foster father decided to set up camp.

“It’s already dark, so we will camp here.”

“Understood!”

Well, it wasn't as though it had been definitively determined that this was the base of the Five Poisons Sect, and besides, it was better to conduct a thorough search when it was bright out.

Even if I activated Cat's Dark Night Technique, it didn’t mean everything became bright as day, and if we wanted assistance from the Tang Family, daylight was definitely preferable.

So, deciding to investigate further once morning came, we quickly prepared a place to rest near the cave entrance.

Though “a place to rest” simply meant laying down some grass to make it soft and lighting a fire.

While sitting around the campfire, having a light meal, and entrusting the night watch to the beasts brought by the Beast Palace, we had fallen asleep.

‘C-Cold.’

A chill felt in my half-sleep.

As I woke up due to the cold, I felt that my clothes were damp.

By dawn, dew had started to fall, leaving my clothes wet and clammy.

“Ugh… Even in a hot place like this, dawn is cold.”

As I sat up, I noticed Seol noona, who had been sleeping beside me, had pulled over my banana plant leaf due to the cold.

Cho, whom I was holding while sleeping, also had a back soaked in dew.

To keep them from catching dew, I carefully covered Hua-eun and Seol noona with the banana plant leaves and looked around.

That’s when I saw Grandfather and my foster father sitting by the campfire, roasting half-dried meat.

Both of them were martial masters who only needed two to three hours of sleep a day, so it seemed they had woken earlier than the others.

“Soryong, you’re awake? If you’re cold, come warm yourself by the fire. Since we’re on the northern side of the mountain, the dew is heavy.”

“Yes, Grandfather.”

At the sound of my movement, Grandfather called me over to the fire.

As I approached, my foster father handed me a warm skewer of roasted meat and spoke.

“Here, eat this to warm up your body.”

“Thank you.”

“By the way, I suppose we should assign you a beast as well, Soryong. You're from the Beast Palace, after all, it doesn’t make sense that you don’t have even one beast.”

The reason my foster father said this was because each person from the Beast Palace had at least one beast with them, and they were all sleeping warmly, curled up with them like sleeping bags.

I was also sleeping while holding Cho, but Cho was a bit cold.

Centipedes, after all, are cold-blooded creatures.

Then Grandfather smiled and said,

“You could just sleep holding Hua-eun. Why is a young man being so cautious? The wedding may be later, but even if a child were to come before that, no one would be harsh about it… No, in fact, the Tang Family is in dire need of children right now, so it’d be something to be praised for. Of course.”

“Ghk… Cough…”

At Grandfather’s words, the greasy meat I was biting off the skewer went down the wrong pipe into my windpipe instead of my esophagus, and I barely managed to cough it out. At that moment, Cho crawled over to me.

As Cho laid her head on my lap, the elders smiled.

“Ah, those were females too, weren’t they? Well then, Soryong, that means they’re yours?”

“Well, in that case, it would be difficult to assign him a beast. Who knows how the other animals might react out of fear of those creatures.”

-Ts, Tsurur…

Suddenly, the elders’ flustering comments connecting me and my eldest daughter, Cho.

I had just begun to wave my hand frantically and protest, asking what on earth they were talking about.

“T-That’s not it! Cho and I are, um, like a parent and child…”

-Tak! Tak. Tak tak tak…

Whether a stone had fallen from the cliff or not, the sound of rocks tumbling came from the pile of collapsed boulders.

In the quiet of dawn, the clear sound drew everyone’s gaze in that direction.

In the pale light of early morning, we all turned to look at the cliff above the rock pile.

And then.

While we were all looking up at the cliff, Grandfather Man of Ten Thousand Poisons suddenly shouted in surprise.

“Hmm? Th-That is!?”

And he immediately used Qinggong to shoot toward the top of the collapsed boulders where Seol noona had checked earlier.

“What’s going on?”

“Is there something up there?”

While my foster father and I looked at each other and wondered about the cause of Grandfather’s sudden action.

From atop the rock pile, Grandfather’s voice called out to my foster father.

“Beast Palace Head, you should come take a look.”

Grandfather was calling for my foster father.

Grandfather seemed to have discovered something, so I followed my foster father and leapt up toward the top of the rocks. Where Grandfather stood appeared to be the spot where the collapse of the cave entrance had started.

He was pressing his hand against a point on the cracked rock, and then, as he lifted his hand, he spoke.

“Take a look at this, Beast Palace Head.”

“This is!?”

“A handprint!?”

Revealed in the dim light of dawn, where Grandfather had lifted his hand, was the imprint of a human palm.

On the rocky face of the cave wall, a distinct red handprint, seemingly made by a human palm, was clearly marked.

And when the vines hanging above were pulled away, letters that had remained clear even after a hundred years were revealed.

「Here, the Five Poisons Sect shall be sealed for eternity.」

Words clearly left behind by ancestors of the Tang Family or the Beast Palace.

My foster father and I gasped in admiration at the revealed characters.

“Ooh!”

“So this really is the place!?”

It definitely felt like the location we had sought out was indeed the last stronghold of the old Five Poisons Sect.

“That’s right. It certainly seems to be here. This mark must be the Crimson Palm Divine Hand... I can’t believe our ancestor trained it to such a level…”

“Haha, an incredible level indeed.”

The story was that a single palm strike had cracked the rock wall and sealed the cave entrance.

I had thought the Tang Family only had sneaky martial arts using hidden weapons and poison, but this was unexpected.

‘Maybe a hundred years ago, they were actually a pretty impressive family?’

Just as I was thinking that the Tang Family might have been a respectable clan a hundred years ago, the two elders continued their conversation.

“Let’s rest for now, and when the sun is up, we’ll search to see if there’s another way in. If not, we’ll have to clear away the rocks at the entrance.”

“That seems best.”

It did seem like we had found the place correctly, but with the blocked entrance, I was thinking the warriors were going to have a tough time. I was about to leap down from the rock pile when.

-Zzziiiiii!

Suddenly, a noisy, screeching sound echoed from above my head.

It was a sound like audio device noise, and at that, my foster father shouted urgently.

"Oh no! The bats are returning!"

The source of the strange sound was the returning swarm of bats.

At dawn, the bats that had gone out to hunt the previous evening were now returning.

As I turned my head, I saw the brightening sky and a black swarm of bats flying in like a wave.

“Let’s get back!”

At my foster father’s shout, I remembered that the entrance the bats had been flying in and out of, the one Seol had mentioned, was right where we were standing.

Just as my foster father said, I immediately leapt downward.

If we were careless, we could have been surrounded by the returning bat swarm.

Bats weren’t particularly dangerous animals, but if they flew densely right in front of your face, it’d be uncomfortable.

I didn’t really like bats either, so I followed my foster father’s command.

‘Snakes, lizards and centipedes are cute, but bats with wings and fur… not so much.’

However, contrary to our worries, the massive black bat swarm passed right by us and began flying toward the top of the cliff.

At that sight, my foster father shouted toward me.

“Ryong! It seems there’s another entrance! Take that child and go up the cliff to check!”

It seemed the entrance wasn’t the one Seol had identified. And “that child” surely referred to Cho.

I quickly shouted toward Cho.

“Understood! Cho! Let’s go!”

-Tsrrt!

At my words, Cho swiftly coiled around my body.

Soon, her body began to rise.

As our bodies floated up into the path of the bat swarm, the massive wave of bats split in two, flowing past us on either side.

As I hovered in the sky and stared blankly at the sight of the bat wave splitting like a black tide.

-Tsurur!

Came Cho’s cry.

“What? Did you find something?”

At Cho’s cry, I looked in the direction her antennae pointed, and saw the swarm of bats, which had split apart past us, rejoining into one mass and pouring into a large gaping hole above the cave.

It seemed that over the course of a hundred years, the entrance to the old Five Poisons Sect had opened in a different direction.