The World's Greatest is Dead

All right, let’s do the rough math.

What were the odds of running into my worthless older brother on the road to Liaoning when we had not even reached Liaoning territory yet?

And what were the odds of finding Bow Ghost, stuck in a younger body, hiding in a wagon full of food supplies?

Either one by itself was absurdly unlikely. So what were the chances of both happening at once?

Whatever else, one thing was certain.

If all of this was coincidence, then something was seriously wrong.

Both of those things happening at the same time?

Ridiculous.

It should have been ridiculous.

And yet it had happened to me.

The filthy-beautiful little girl glaring at me with a wronged look on her face sat right in front of me.

Looking at Bow Ghost, once called the greatest beauty under heaven, I had to swallow a sigh.

“...Bow Ghost. Why...”

Why was this woman here?

“...Why are you here?”

“...Because of you.”

“Me...?”

“You turn me into this and think it makes sense to disappear afterward?”

“...What?”

That was the kind of line that could lead to a truly catastrophic misunderstanding.

What the hell was that dangerous wording? 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

I stared at Bow Ghost in disbelief.

“Hurry and put me back—”

Whiff!

“Ghk!?”

The unconscious Bang Yuseong suddenly flung out an arm and dragged Bow Ghost into a hug.

“Uuugh...”

“L-let go!”

“A pillow...?”

“Let go of me this inst—ugh! You reek of alcohol...!”

He was talking in his sleep.

Bow Ghost looked outright disgusted by the stench pouring off Bang Yuseong. She struggled to get free, but—

“Urk!”

No matter how much she thrashed, she could not pry his arm loose.

“What are you standing there for? Help me!”

“...”

I scratched my cheek.

What exactly was I supposed to do with this outrageously brazen creature?

She feels completely different from my first impression of her.

Back then, she had seemed lofty, cold, the sort of existence who looked down on everyone alive.

Even Yoo Cheongil had treated her lightly on the surface only because the weight she carried was so overwhelming.

Is it because her body got younger?

She felt a lot more... pitiful now.

A lot more.

“Hmm.”

I watched for a moment, then shifted my thoughts.

“No, don’t just stand there watching—!”

I can’t feel her presence.

That was what hit me as I looked at Bow Ghost.

I could not sense a trace of presence from her.

That was strange.

I should’ve noticed the moment I approached this wagon.

If there had been a person inside, I should have sensed at least that much. But I hadn’t noticed a thing until I threw Bang Yuseong in on top of her.

No—strictly speaking, I still could not feel much of anything now.

At this point, it was fairer to say there was nothing there at all.

Is she even human?

Was she human at all?

Could someone exist like this, with absolutely nothing to sense?

It was almost—

Like a ghost...

I froze.

Then I turned back to Bow Ghost.

A ghost?

The comparison fit more than it should have.

Her current state, I meant.

You could see her. You could touch her. And yet she was ghostlike.

“Hm.”

“Hey! Stop staring and do something—!”

“I’ve got a lot to think about today...”

I turned my back on her.

The despair that flashed across Bow Ghost’s face was almost immediate.

“Hey! Wait—!”

“Mgh! Uugh!”

“Damn you!”

I heard plenty of noise behind me, but I kept walking.

She would probably be fine.

Bang Yuseong might be insane, but he had at least stopped short of doing anything to a girl who looked that young.

“I’ll kill you...!!”

I ignored Bow Ghost’s voice and kept going.

*****

[Kehkeh... kehkehkeh.]

The laughter would not stop.

Hearing it from my waist, I let out a hollow chuckle and asked,

What’s got you so amused?

It was the Heavenly Demon laughing from the Divine Sword.

[That vile bitch has ended up like this. Why would this seat not be delighted?]

“...”

The emotion in his voice was the same as before.

No matter how I looked at it, the Heavenly Demon loathed Bow Ghost.

Maybe loathing was too mild a word.

It might have been contempt.

Why were they on such bad terms?

I was curious, but I did not ask.

Just looking at it told me the answer would turn into a nuisance.

Besides, now was not the time to be asking that.

...Do you know anything about Bow Ghost’s condition?

Why had she ended up like that?

I asked the Heavenly Demon, but—

[Who knows. Even I have never seen a state quite like this. It does not appear to be rejuvenation, at least.]

He had reached the same conclusion I had.

It was not rejuvenation, but she had undeniably returned to a younger body.

And one with no presence, no detectable existence.

What you might call a half-material body.

Visible and tangible, yet ghostlike.

But if I call it ghostly, that isn’t right either.

It did not carry a ghost’s presence.

There was something fundamentally unexplainable about it.

And the strangest part was—

I can’t even feel the baleful force I planted in her because of it.

For a being beyond heaven to get manhandled like that by a drunken Bang Yuseong—

That means her physical ability and inner qi are restricted too.

For all practical purposes, she was almost a normal person.

Maybe worse than a normal person.

...Some heavy restriction has been clamped onto her.

How?

I propped my chin on my hand and thought, but the answer did not come right away.

And the fact that she followed me all the way here means...

It meant the baleful force I had put into her was the problem.

And that she was in a position where she needed it removed somehow.

Hm.

Bow Ghost.

...I’ve already got too much to deal with, and {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} more keeps piling up.

This was not a situation where I should have been wasting attention on Bow Ghost.

But things just kept happening anyway.

The Sky-Crushing Palace comes first.

Those bastards.

I thought of what they had been trying to do near Liaoning.

I need to move.

I had to get into Liaoning as fast as possible and start digging into this.

I’ve got a bad feeling.

My instincts were telling me as much.

That uselessly accurate sense of dread of mine—

The damned one that was never wrong.

*****

We took the dawn watch in shifts and greeted the morning that way.

We were planning to leave early, so people were just about done with the basic preparations when—

“...Mm. What is this?”

I looked at the groggy Bang Yuseong with open disgust.

“Ugh, my head. Huh? Little brother? Am I still drunk...? Why am I seeing my little brother? Is this a dream?”

Bang Yuseong stared at me with a face full of exhaustion as he spoke.

“...Does it feel like a dream?”

“It talks too? Then it really can’t be a dream. If it isn’t, this makes no sense... What’s this, then?”

Bang Yuseong lifted the thing lying beside him.

It was Bow Ghost.

“...Brother.”

“Hm?”

“...Put that down.”

He really had picked her up the way someone would pick up a doll.

And she was, for all that, still one of the beings beyond heaven.

[You call a human being “that,” and yet you think she is the strange one?]

The Heavenly Demon cut in with a laugh.

I ignored him.

“Ugh... damn this hangover...”

“Drink this and wake up.”

I handed him a dipper of water I had brought over.

“Oh! Much appreciated.”

Bang Yuseong took it and gulped it down.

It was cold water from the valley stream.

“Khh... ah, now I feel a little more alive...”

“...Are you awake now?”

“Enough to know this isn’t a dream. Still, who would’ve thought I’d see my little brother like this?”

“What exactly were you doing here in the first place?”

“That’s what I’d like to know too. I definitely went to see a friend... so why am I here? And where is ‘here,’ anyway?”

He did not even know where he was.

So he really had been blackout drunk.

“...Forget it. Just get your head straight.”

I gave up.

It was not as if this was the first time I had seen him like this.

By now, it barely even registered.

“In that case, can I lie down a bit longer?”

“Do whatever you want. Better yet, please do.”

Yes.

Honestly, he was better off collapsed and useless.

The moment he heard me, Bang Yuseong dropped right back down.

“Then wake me after I’ve had a nice nap.”

Would be better if you just died.

“Hm? What was that, little brother?”

“I said you should just die, Brother.”

“Ah, so I didn’t mishear. My little brother really is as prickly as ever.”

Bang Yuseong went right back to sleep without taking the slightest damage.

A moment later, I heard him snoring.

There was no other word for him.

He was insane.

“Hah...”

I let out a sigh as I looked at him, and something stirred beside me.

“Ungh...”

It was Bow Ghost.

She must have finally woken up, because she was pushing herself upright with a wobble.

“Ugh...”

“You’re awake?”

“...”

Bow Ghost turned a sharp glare on me.

“You...!”

She was just about to unleash the resentment written all over her face when—

Grrrrrrk.

“...”

“...”

An awkward sound cut the moment dead by force.

It had not come from me.

And it had not come from Bang Yuseong either.

That meant there was only one culprit.

“Be quiet.”

“I didn’t say a word.”

The one caught red-handed was the one getting angry first.

What was that supposed to be?

“This wasn’t me, it was—”

Grrrrrrk.

“...”

“Damn it.”

The tips of Bow Ghost’s ears turned red.

I watched her for a moment, then asked carefully,

“...Would you like something to eat?”

“...Be silent. I need no such pity.”

Grrrrrrk.

“Ah, shut up already!”

Unfortunately for her, her stomach did not seem to agree.

“Come on.”

I picked her up.

“Eek! Put me down!”

She thrashed, but that was all.

That feeble body of hers could not even manage a proper escape.

So I carried her straight toward the others.

It was not as if I could keep hiding her forever.

*****

By the time I reached the others, they were already fully prepared to leave.

We had decided not to cook this early in the morning, but what could I do.

“Right now...?”

“Yeah. Just make something simple.”

“...”

Poison Dragon frowned.

For reference, he had been handling the food.

He was much better at it than I had expected.

“Just some porridge will do.”

“...All right... but, Young Master Bang.”

“Yeah?”

“What exactly are you carrying?”

“Ah, this?”

“This?”

In my hand was Bow Ghost.

Apparently I had been holding her too much like baggage without realizing it.

The others turned to look at me too.

Under all those eyes, I answered flatly,

“A lost child. Found her on the road.”

“A lost child? A foreign-looking girl?”

“Yeah.”

“How would someone like that end up in a place like this...?”

“Exactly. I was curious too, so I brought her back.”

“Grrrk.”

“Temper’s rotten too, apparently.”

Bow Ghost snarled.

Maybe having a child’s body had changed her temperament too.

It had changed it quite a bit, if so.

“Feels like our numbers keep going up. I’m not imagining that, am I, Junior?”

Silver Moon Sword looked at me as he said it.

That was exactly what I had been thinking.

“...This should be the last one.”

Please let it be.

I meant that from the bottom of my heart.

For some reason, it felt like if my luck turned bad enough, we would pick up even more.

“Anyway. Leaving that aside, just make the porridge. This lost child says she’s starving.”

“When did I ever say I was—!”

Grrrrrrk.

“...”

Bow Ghost snapped her mouth shut.

Her body was brutally honest.

“Damn it...”

The misery in her voice was unmistakable.

None of the people here could possibly know.

No one would ever guess that Bow Ghost—one of the beings beyond heaven, the greatest beauty under heaven—was standing here with her stomach growling from hunger.

After giving Poison Dragon the request, I sorted through what I needed to do once we reached Liaoning.

...We need to eat and move. Fast.

There seemed to be a lot more on that list than I had expected.

*****

As smoke slowly began rising from the campsite at dawn so they could prepare food—

Someone sat on a tree branch in the not-so-distant forest and watched the scene below.

The figure was blurred, as though soaked into the shadows, and not one person in the camp sensed his presence.

With a mask covering his face, he looked toward one spot in particular.

The wagon carrying the food supplies.

His gaze slid over the figure snoring inside it.

“...”

Then, without a word, he vanished.

At the instant he disappeared, the man’s eyes shone a vivid blue.

A very vivid blue.