Deep in the heart of Hubei.
The place where every rumor in the martial world flows like a river.
The Strategy Hall of the Martial Arts Alliance was unusually quiet that day.
Beneath a massive map of the martial world that covered an entire wall from floor to ceiling—
A man sat fanning himself slowly with a white-feathered fan.
A forehead as smooth as silk.
Eyes deep and cool as still water.
The Alliance's greatest strategist, said to calculate the edge of a blade a thousand miles away without leaving his seat.
His name was Zhuge Yan.
Before him stood Song Baek, Head of the Intelligence Division, holding out a worn letter with both hands.
It had arrived by the fastest carrier pigeon from the Gwak Clan of Taiyuan, Shanxi—an urgent dispatch.
"Strategist. An urgent report from the Gwak Clan of Taiyuan. Three nights ago, they were robbed."
"Robbed?"
Zhuge Yan repeated the word without pausing his fan.
"Yes. Someone made off with a bundle of valuables from the clan head's private vault—a thousand-year snow ginseng, several other rare medicines, and a good amount of gold. The Gwak Clan made enough noise about it that we filed a report, but honestly… it looks like the work of some quick-footed petty thief who got lucky."
"A petty thief."
THWACK.
The fan stopped.
"Division Head Song. What kind of place is the Gwak Clan's vault?"
"They don't advertise it, but it's no ordinary storeroom. It's a hidden treasury buried beneath the clan head's own bedchamber."
"Could a common criminal break into a sealed room like that?"
"From what I've gathered, the guard posted there holds no impressive title, but his martial skill is on par with an elder. He's apparently simple-minded enough to stand watch every single day without complaint—which made him an ideal sentry. But as luck would have it, he came down with a stomach ailment. And as further luck would have it, a spare key he'd made in secret—out of fear of being scolded—was discovered. The thief had heaven on his side. Without that chain of coincidences, he never would have gotten through the door."
Zhuge Yan pressed a fingertip to one line of the letter.
"Heaven's favor… When coincidences keep stacking on top of each other, they stop being coincidences."
His eyes narrowed.
"Witnesses saw him, yet there were no marks on the wall, not a single footprint… Division Head Song. A man breaks into a hidden vault deep inside someone's home and leaves no trace whatsoever. Could you manage that?"
Song Baek cleared his throat.
"Well… if he truly is a descendant of the Cheonroe Sect as he claimed, then a lightness art beyond our understanding—one that leaves no trace—would certainly be within the realm of possibility. But given how desperately he avoided any direct confrontation, I still believe this is simply a lucky, fast-footed petty thief."
"A petty thief."
The corner of Zhuge Yan's mouth curved faintly upward.
"A descendant of a sect that has hidden itself away for centuries disguised himself as a common laborer and spent three or four days quietly hauling water and splitting firewood."
"Division Head Song. Do you know what that means?"
"……A very hardworking petty thief?"
"No."
Zhuge Yan stated it flatly.
"It's a demonstration. A message that says: *I can walk into your home as a servant whenever I choose.*"
Song Baek's eyes went wide.
"The Gwak Clan wasn't robbed. They were shown, in full view, that a road had been laid straight to their inner chambers."
"And by the time they realized it, it was already over."
Song Baek swallowed without meaning to.
He was, after all, the Head of the Intelligence Division.
Summoning the last of his professional conscience, he offered the simplest truth he had.
"Even so, Strategist—if you read the report to the end, there are many signs of compounding coincidence. The guard happened to be away with a stomach ailment. The spare key happened to be hidden in a crack in the stone. It's possible the man was simply lucky."
"One coincidence is luck."
"Two is a curious thing."
"But three or more in a row is no longer coincidence. It is someone's design."
Zhuge Yan tapped the next passage with the tip of his fan.
"He was standing before the vault at the precise moment the guard stepped away."
"He found the hidden spare key on the first try."
"He slipped through dozens of the Gwak Clan's elite fighters and Elder Gwak Cheolsan's barrage of throwing weapons without so much as a torn hem."
The fan folded slowly shut.
"Division Head Song. If all of this is luck—"
The Strategy Hall fell silent for a moment.
"—then it is not the luck of a man. It means heaven itself has chosen his side."
Song Baek felt cold sweat trace a line down his back.
When he'd first read the letter, his thought had been simple enough.
*Some hungry nobody with fast feet got obscenely lucky and made off with a haul.*
That was all.
But filtered through Zhuge Yan's words, the same incident had taken on an entirely different weight.
"Furthermore."
Zhuge Yan narrowed his eyes for the first time.
"The clan head added a peculiar testimony."
"……You mean the incident thirty years ago?"
"Yes."
He read slowly down the page.
"Thirty years ago, the Gwak Clan had their rare medicines stolen in exactly the same manner."
"That individual, too, slipped through the clan's core fighters like a ghost."
"He crossed the wall and vanished with blue lightning at his heels."
"And before he left, he announced himself as a member of the Cheonroe Sect."
The lanterns of the Strategy Hall seemed to flicker all at once.
"Across thirty years of time."
"The same Gwak Clan."
"Struck twice by the same lightning."
Zhuge Yan rose from his seat and stood before the map of the martial world.
Then he pressed a dot of red ink onto the location of the Gwak Clan in Taiyuan.
"Division Head Song."
"Yes."
"A mere petty thief just happens to choose the same house his sect robbed thirty years ago?"
"You'd call that a coincidence too?"
Song Baek said nothing.
His mind was in chaos.
*Has Strategist Zhuge lost his mind? Or have I truly been a complete idiot all along?*
"No."
Zhuge Yan declared it without hesitation.
"This is the Cheonroe Sect's consistent, deliberate intent toward the Gwak Clan."
His gaze fixed on the red dot.
"They know there is something at the Gwak Clan."
"Thirty years ago, taking only three roots instead of everything—"
"Today, taking only one bundle instead of emptying the vault entirely—"
"None of it is greed. It is restraint. And it is a message."
The truth, of course, was different.
The three roots thirty years ago had been Cheonbija's whimsical attack of conscience.
The single bundle today was Pung Hyeon's desperate practicality—too much weight and he couldn't run.
But in Zhuge Yan's mind, every last detail was clicking into place as one vast and intricate picture.
"A legendary secret sect said to pass down a lightness art faster than the Somersault Cloud, master to a single disciple."
"One that slipped into the Alliance Lord's own bedchamber and trimmed his beard."
"That walked in and out of the unorthodox faction's treasure vaults as if they were its own home."
Zhuge Yan murmured it like a verse from an old song.
"The Cheonroe Sect—dismissed for so long as the boasting of old men—"
"Division Head Song."
"Yes."
"Is being reproduced right now, word for word, on top of the Gwak Clan's report. And…"
He touched the final line with the careful reverence of a man handling something precious.
"Do you know what he shouted as he left?"
Song Baek swallowed.
Zhuge Yan read it aloud, slowly.
"*I am Pung Hyeon of the Cheonroe Sect.*"
CRACK.
That name rang through the air of the Strategy Hall.
"Not hiding his identity in the slightest."
"He announced his name and his sect without hesitation."
"That means he is not afraid."
His gaze deepened.
"No."
"He wanted us to know."
"That the Cheonroe Sect has returned."
THWACK.
The white-feathered fan snapped shut.
"From this moment, Pung Hyeon of the Cheonroe Sect is designated a top-priority surveillance target of the Martial Arts Alliance."
"Understood."
"Deploy the Beggars' Sect's full intelligence network. Track his movements—every last detail, nothing missed."
"Yes."
"But do not provoke him under any circumstances."
Zhuge Yan's voice dropped low.
"Until we understand his true intentions, no one lays a finger on him."
"……Understood."
Song Baek bowed deeply, sweat beading at his temples, and backed out of the room.
The moment the door to the Strategy Hall closed, Zhuge Yan opened his fan again.
"Pung Hyeon of the Cheonroe Sect……"
The smile that spread slowly across his lips was said to be the most dangerous in all the martial world.
"Just what kind of game are you playing?"
At that very moment—
The man whose grand designs were being mapped by the martial world's greatest mind—
Was buying hotteok at a street stall somewhere in Shanxi.
His pockets were heavy with gold from the Gwak Clan.
His stomach was at peace.
"Hey, mister—five more hotteok, please. Extra honey."
Just then, the chatter of men at the next stall drifted into Pung Hyeon's ears.
"You hear about this? The Gwak Clan in Taiyuan is in an uproar."
"Some ghost of a guy broke into the clan head's own chambers, they say."
"No ordinary person, either. Blue lightning crackling at his feet—some legendary sect, apparently."
"Cheon-something… what was it again?"
For just a moment—
Pung Hyeon's jaw, mid-bite into a hotteok, went still.
*……Lightning? That sounds kind of familiar.*
He tilted his head for a second.
Then shrugged.
Blue lightning.
Legendary sect.
There was no way something that grand had anything to do with him.
*There really are all kinds of impressive people out in the martial world. Nothing to do with me.*
*ACHOO!*
Pung Hyeon sneezed suddenly.
He sniffled and muttered to himself.
"……Someone's talking trash about me somewhere."
"Or that old geezer's badmouthing me again."
And then—
He reached for the fresh hotteok, steam curling off it in little wisps.
"Hey, mister!"
"More honey! More honey!"
In the Strategy Hall in Hubei—
The martial world's greatest strategist was burning the midnight oil, trying to fathom the profound depths of Pung Hyeon's intentions.
In the street markets of the martial world—
His legend was spreading from mouth to mouth.
And the one who had set all of it in motion—
Was being moved to sincere, wholehearted emotion by a single honey hotteok.
The snowball of misunderstanding—
Was rolling bigger today, too.
And as always, the only one who didn't know it was him.