Murim Troubleshooter Dan Mujin

Chapter 28: That Name I Know All Too Well

Clatter, bang.

Someone tumbled all the way down the stairs and burst out.

Old Man Jang, his face flushed red, slammed the door open and spotted me and Ilhong, wearing a look of sheer disbelief.

“You… that damned beggar brat from before!”

Like a roving singer who came last year and didn’t die, only to come again.

His face crumpled the instant he recognized me.

“Old Man Jang, if you borrowed money, you should pay it back. Why are you playing dumb?”

I waved the promissory note right in front of his eyes as I spoke.

Old Man Jang trembled his beard and pointed at me, enraged.

“You little bastard… where did you even get that promissory note!”

The moment he shouted that a beggar had appeared, two servants came rushing out of the store, clubs in hand like it was routine.

“What’s this? I got it from Chairman Gam Un.”

“…What! Don’t tell me you’re with the Wanderers' Guild?”

The old man flinched and asked again when the chairman of the Wanderers' Guild came out of the mouth of a brat he thought was a beggar.

I shrugged in place of an answer. Then Ilhong whispered into my ear.

“You’re not an official wanderer yet.”

“But he doesn’t know that.”

Anyway, once we pull off this request, I’ll be official.

Let’s just say I’m using a future identity in advance.

“Anyway, what the client wants is for you to at least return the principal. Old Man Jang.”

“…Insolent punk. This is between me and Brother Wang. Mind your own business and get lost.”

Telling a wanderer—who literally makes a living by meddling—not to meddle?

That’s like telling a sparrow to ignore a millstone.

“If it was just between the two of you, why’d you drag in your constable relative?”

Without paying a single coin of interest, he kept interfering with the client who tried appealing to the officials.

On top of that, he used his power to beat and drive away several wanderers.

“…”

Old Man Jang clenched his lips and glared at me in silence.

He quietly exchanged glances with the two servants standing behind him.

Ominous signs. They say when someone runs out of arguments, they turn to anger.

“So it's just the two of you today? Perfect. Break each of their arms and legs.”

See? Not a single move out of expectations.

Typical Murim folk—when words fail, violence follows.

“Resist, and you’ll get another arm broken.”

“Just sit still and get beat!”

The two servants shouted nonsense and swung their clubs.

Fwip!

I bent at the waist and dodged the first strike. Then I drove a palm strike, laced with internal energy, straight into his gut.

“Guh!”

With a sound like bursting leather, one servant flew nearly ten feet.

As for the second, I used a ghostly movement technique to step in half a pace and disrupt his motion, then buried my fist in his jaw.

Thud!

His mouth, opened to yell, snapped shut with a click.

The two sturdy servants dropped in quick succession, completely overwhelmed.

All of it happened in the blink of an eye.

Old Man Jang widened his eyes at my unordinary stance and clean movements.

“You… where did you learn such martial arts…?”

I wasn’t the same person who used to scrap with the town beggars.

This body now bore seven years of internal energy—an upright Murim man.

“You always had sticky fingers, Old Man. How could you even think of breaking kids’ limbs?”

“Hear hear.”

Ilhong nodded in agreement beside me.

As I rolled my shoulders and stepped forward, Old Man Jang flinched and hurriedly backed away.

“D-Don’t come any closer.”

“No can do.”

I learned from Hwang Geolgae—commands are the privilege of the strong.

One step, two steps. The more karma he’d stacked, the paler Old Man Jang’s face became with each step I took.

“For a Murim man to torment commoners… aren’t you ashamed?”

What a shameless old bastard.

“You’re not ashamed of stiffing your debt and feigning ignorance? A man should have some decency.”

“He’s right. You even expanded the building with that money, and you won’t pay a dime of interest? That’s just petty.”

As Ilhong and I took turns throwing jabs, Old Man Jang ground his yellow teeth furiously.

“Tch, shut it! In business, delays in repayment happen! But to publicly humiliate me and hire a wanderer…?! Now I’m too pissed to give you a cent!”

Old Man Jang, veins bulging in his neck, argued as if his life depended on it. That’s what real villainy looks like.

“What a textbook example of 甘呑苦吐—swallowing the sweet and spitting the bitter. Cut the nonsense and just pay up.”

The classic human garbage move.

“There’s not a single coin for a trashy wanderer like you!”

“Old man really needs a beating to come to his senses.”

An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.

If he planned to do it to me, I’ll do the same. Snap a limb or two, maybe he’ll wise up.

“Hmph, just lay a finger on me. My constable cousin will beat you down and make sure you never set foot in Beijing again!”

But as I tried to squeeze the squid, Old Man Jang suddenly used his capture authority to bluff.

That very thing that crushed wanderers with no power or backing.

But I didn’t even twitch an eyebrow.

“Then will you report that to the constables at the magistrate office too?”

“Report what, exactly?”

“Miryang Sericulture.”

The moment a secret no one should know left my lips, Old Man Jang jolted like he’d been stabbed with a needle.

“W-What nonsense is that?”

His usually shameless voice now trembled noticeably.

“Selling off raw silk dirt cheap? A man like you would never sacrifice profit. Right?”

“…Heh, and here I thought you had something. Trying to pin nonsense on an innocent man with no proof. I shouldn’t have even talked to mongrels like you.”

Trying to bolt in a hurry, Old Man Jang turned to leave.

But Ilhong’s next words froze him in place.

“Il Hyehyang, Floor Manager of Honghwa Brothel.”

Like a puppet dancing a broken jig, Old Man Jang slowly turned to face us.

Ilhong grinned beside me.

“She’s the liaison supplying you the silk, right? We know everything.”

The two brats standing here weren’t some run-of-the-mill fools.

They were something much darker and more dangerous.

“H-How could brats like you possibly know that…”

Terrified by how accurately we knew the identity of the liaison from the Hao Sect, Old Man Jang stammered his words.

Actively engaging in tax evasion of silk, not to mention reaping obscene profits—clearly, the man’s guts had spilled out of his belly.

“That’s none of your concern. Just decide. Will you face execution alongside your illustrious relative, or repay my client and at least save your neck?”

Once reported through Eun Hwaran, the high officials starving for achievements would come down dancing blades.

Now that’s how you make a threat.

“…I-I’ll pay! But I’m short on cash right now, so if you could just give me some time…”

“Oh, come the fuck on. And that’s supposed to be my problem? You didn’t give a damn about my client’s situation either.”

He was already someone who’d betrayed another’s trust once.

Nothing from that bastard’s mouth was worth believing.

“Cut the crap and cough up the money if you don’t wanna die. Sell off that silk stash, or mortgage that gaudy building of yours!”

The key to recovering overdue payments was your voice and your presence.

You had to push these shameless bastards hard so they couldn’t think up excuses.

“Wow, you’re good, boss. You really sound like an evil loan shark.”

Ilhong, showering praise as he watched me deliver my powerful threat.

Context-wise, that probably meant I did well. I’ll take it that way.

“So, what’s it gonna be? You gonna pay up, or die?”

The disaster he brought upon himself.

“H-Haa…”

Old Man Jang, who had been shameless all along, now visibly turned pale.

His pupils trembled with anxiety, unsure what to do. His upper and lower teeth clacked against each other.

“I-I…”

His mouth finally let out some words.

As the sun began to set, casting long shadows—

The boys who had gone to collect the unpaid debt burst through the doors of the Wanderers' Guild.

The wanderers, who had been sipping liquor, turned their curious eyes toward them.

“They look way too fine for someone who went to collect a debt.”

“Usually, even if you roll around and scream your guts out, there’s barely a chance of collecting…”

Normally, it was a brutal request—one that got you pelted with garbage and returned home covered in bruises.

“Maybe they gave up halfway and came back?”

“Knew it. If we couldn’t pull it off, there’s no way those brats could.”

The murmurs of the wanderers were a mix of disappointment and relief.

Even Chairman Gam Un, who had sent them off hoping they’d struggle a bit, quietly gave up his expectations when he saw how unharmed they were.

Thud.

The boy named Dan Mujin plopped a heavy coin pouch on the table.

When he untied the string, a cascade of glittering gold coins and silver coins spilled out.

The wanderers’ eyes popped wide open.

“…What the—did they actually collect?”

“No way.”

People stood there, mouths agape, too shocked to speak.

“Twenty-five gold coins. And twenty silver coins as interest.”

“Amazing, right? That’s our boss for you.”

The handsome boy tossed the coin pouch up and down like he wanted to show it off, while the pretty-faced one grinned beside him.

Chairman Gam Un stopped what he was doing and walked over to them.

“How did you pull it off?”

He had planned to give them the Wanderers' Token if they’d brought back even a few silver coins, just to acknowledge their persistence.

But they had returned with the full amount. Not even a coin missing, including interest.

“I pressured him.”

“Everyone tries pressuring him. But they always get chased out.”

You couldn’t risk crossing the magistrate office in the Imperial Capital, Beijing.

Getting exiled or thrown into prison would be a major headache. It would immediately threaten your livelihood.

“But this time, the magistrate office took my side.”

“…?”

Dan Mujin said something cryptic, unsure if Gam Un had caught the whisper.

“Ilhong was a huge help. As for the rest, that’s trade secret.”

What mattered was the success, and the boy wasn’t going to reveal his hand easily.

Eun Hwaran had said his skills were trustworthy, though I’d been skeptical.

“Hmph.”

It seemed an interesting one had wandered in.

Gam Un scratched his scar, now looking intrigued.

The client, upon hearing I’d retrieved the money, came dashing over from a nearby bookstore.

“A kid this young… are you telling me you really collected money from that wretched man?”

At first, he doubted I could pull off something that even rough-looking wanderers couldn’t.

But the reactions of the surrounding wanderers, and the repeated testimony from Chairman Gam Un, soon convinced him that this wasn’t a joke.

“…I thought I’d never see that money again. Thanks to you, a huge burden is off my chest.”

“Don’t lend money to friends from now on. You’ll lose both money and friendship.”

A clean refusal was often the secret to longer-lasting relationships.

If you don’t lend, they might get offended for a bit. But if you do and they don’t pay back, they become enemies for life.

“You speak the truth. Only after getting burned did I realize that. You're young, but it feels like you’re more of a life senior than me.”

And then, as if something had dawned on him, the bookstore owner muttered—

“All I asked for was the principal, so the interest is yours.”

He handed me the coin pouch filled with twenty silver coins and left.

“Thank you, boy. You were a great help.”

He even left with a heartwarming message of gratitude.

Old Man Jang, how could you try to swindle such a good man?

“Feels like we did something nice, boss.”

No kidding.

Maybe because it had been a while since I got a heartfelt thank-you, but something tickled oddly near my dantian.

And now I knew what that sensation was. It was the effect of the Starfall Heart Cultivation Method reacting to a deed of good karma.

The client’s joy became my own. This must be a few more years’ worth of internal energy.

“Just earlier, while shaking him down, I felt like a villain.”

“Hey now, it was a legitimate debt collection.”

I beat a villain and saved my client. By my standards, you couldn’t get more righteous than that.

And I even earned a decent sum. Not a bad start for my first Wanderer request.

“Dan Mujin, take this.”

At that moment, Chairman Gam Un threw a wooden token with something engraved on it.

Gap, Eul, Byeong, Jeong. This one had the lowest grade—Jeong—engraved.

But this sort of thing upgrades naturally as you take on more requests.

“You too. You were a big help.”

Quoting what I said earlier, Gam Un tossed a Wanderers' Token to Ilhong as well.

“Wow, really? Thank you so much!”

Overjoyed, she tightly gripped the Wanderers' Token and burst into a peony-blossom smile.

Even while disguised as a man, that smile had a pull that instinctively drew the eye.

“I mean, I’m grateful, but… is it really okay?”

We were already treated like we got in through connections, so handing them out like a buy-one-get-one might stir some backlash.

“That Wanderers' Token was supposed to be given for recovering even a single silver coin. But you brought back the full principal too… You two are worth at least the work of two wanderers.”

Chairman Gam Un referenced the three or four wanderers who had previously failed and reassured us there was no problem.

“What were we supposed to do when a constable popped out of nowhere?”

“You can’t just make enemies with the authorities in the Imperial Capital where the Son of Heaven resides.”

The wanderers who had been sipping liquor muttered excuses, caught off guard.

“Silence. Wanderers speak with their results. Anyone who doesn’t even understand that dares call themselves a wanderer?”

Chairman Gam Un immediately shut down their complaints, remarking that only the useless ones had big mouths.

Since he was the one who held the authority over requests in the Beijing Branch, the wanderers could only grumble quietly.

“Anyway, since Elder Gam recognized us, I guess we’ll be getting a steady stream of requests from now on?”

“Of course. Good requests are meant for capable wanderers.”

Seems our effort was finally paying off.

With both our qualifications and our guanxi proven, he seemed to be holding us in high regard.

“Then, do you have any requests like subjugating a Heaven-Violating Yin Fiend or a Demonic Practitioner?”

Based on Ilhong’s advice, I planned to build fame by absorbing the infamy of those rogues.

Until I gained an alias and work started coming to me on its own—for the sake of my dream of extending my life.

“Hm, that might be a bit tough right now.”

“Wait, that’s not what you just said.”

I looked at Chairman Gam Un with a baffled expression.

Didn’t he just say capable wanderers get the good requests?

“It’s not that. It’s just that lately, all the Demonic Practitioners and Yin Fiends have either fled or gone into hiding in Hebei.”

Right when I needed to spread my name fast, Chairman Gam Un delivered a strange and unwelcome bit of news.

“What? Why?”

They’d mostly vanished? That was hard to believe.

In a time of poor public order, weren’t those kinds of scum the type to recharge and return within a day?

“Some lady hero who scatters Sword Qi like a storm has been slaying Demonic Practitioners with terrifying momentum. They’ve been wiped out.”

What the hell.

Nothing ever went smoothly in this damned Murim.

“Who is this lady hero, anyway?”

With a resentful tone, I asked about the identity of the woman who was making me take the long way around.

“You ever heard of an alias called Cold Jade Maiden?”

“…”

And that, it seemed, was something I should not have heard.