"And it came to pass a little while later that Wang was summoned to perform a minor service in Egypt. While there he was trapped in a chamber with a secret sect of soldier priests, for the pharaoh wished to see if the tales he had heard were true. Wang, being Wang, easily vanquished the men. But that was not the end. He encountered the same problem in China, Assyria, Babylonia and several lesser kingdoms. None believed that he could be what he claimed."
"Wait a second," Remo interrupted. "Wasn't this what started the Master's Trial? People challenging Wang like he was the best gunslinger in Dodge?"
Chiun's gaze grew hooded. "I am certain as he looks on this very moment, the Great Wang appreciates being compared to a shooter of boomsticks," he said dryly.
Remo had been so drawn in to Chiun's story that for the first time in a year he had forgotten about his invisible company. He shrugged an apology at the vacant air.
"But that was part of the reason for Wang starting the Master's Trial, right?" he asked. "Don't tell me I have to go on that trip again, 'cause if you remember last time it went massively wrong in about a million different ways."
"You went through that ritual long ago. The Master's Trial is an honorable contest between ancient peoples. While the origin is similar, this is something different."
"Yeah? Just so long as this ends different, I'll be happy."
The Master of Sinanju pursed his wrinkled lips. "Are you going to listen or are you going to waste the rest of the day drying your flapping tongue in the sun?"
"I'm listening, I'm listening."
Chiun seemed skeptical. After a moment of fixing his pupil with a gimlet eye, he continued.
"And Wang, who was frustrated that the first years of his masterhood had been spent proving himself to disbelieving rulers, did return to the village deeply troubled. Even from its earliest days Sinanju had always been an art of assassination. But this new age he had ushered in was threatening to turn his most sacred calling into little more than a spectator sport. For many days he did think on the problem. And when the solution finally came to him, Wang's heart soared, for he knew it was right. Hiring runners from neighboring villages, he did send them to the corners of the Earth. The runners carried letters in every language known to man and were delivered to the rulers of every land.
"The letters were an invitation to king and pharaoh, emir and emperor. These leaders were encouraged to send the greatest assassins in their respective lands into battle with the Master Wang. In the ensuing years, when Wang traveled on business to a particular region of the world, the invited thrones sent their chosen combatants to kill the new Master by whatever means and specialities they could devise. The world was smaller in those days, but the journeys were longer. It took ten years' time, but in the end Wang had met the greatest champions of all who questioned the strength of our House. With the end came the dawning of the New Age of Sinanju, for all had seen and all believed. All hail Wang the Great, founder, protector and nurturer of the modern House of Sinanju."
With a proud smile, the Master of Sinanju rested his hands to his lap, fingers interlocking. His pose indicated that he was finished the tale.
"Hail Wang, all right," Remo droned. "He skinned that shogun for thirty-eight big ones more than he was supposed to get, then took the show on the road. He must have scammed a bundle for racking up that ten-year body count."
"The only tribute Wang collected in that time was for the normal services he would have performed as Master anyway," Chiun explained. "He did not charge for the removal of his would-be assassins."
The world seemed to grow very still around Remo. Even the branches of the ash above his head appeared to still in the cold breeze, as if the hand of Wang himself had quelled their gentle movement.
"He killed them for free?" Remo asked, astonished.
"It was a pure ritual, baptized in blood. Wang did not want the taint of money to corrupt it."
Remo blinked. He opened his mouth to speak. He closed his mouth and blinked again.
"Let me get this straight," he said finally. "Free?"
"He deemed the tribute unimportant," Chiun said. He seemed uncomfortable with the notion. "Wang had discovered something almost as vital as tribute itself-the importance of advertising. Have you never wondered, Remo, why in our travels in this, what you would call the modern world, Sinanju is not known to the general population, yet is whispered about by kings in throne rooms and cutthroats who hide in the dark corners of taverns from Marrakech to Taipei?"
"Our reputation," Remo replied. "We've been doing this job for years."
"Yes, and the clown who flips cowburgers and the man with the donkey who picks coffee beans have been about their business for far less time," Chiun replied. "Yet they are known to all. We are known only to those who need to know about us. Thank the wisdom of Wang for this. He understood that ours is a service that is oftentimes rendered in secret. Even before Wang we lived among the shadows, always running the risk of being forgotten when came the dawn. With no night tigers and only one Master of Sinanju in all the world, Wang understood that this new Sinanju ran the risk of being forgotten. Especially with the rise of civilizations and the armies that came with them. And so, lest the world forget, Wang did issue a decree that each generation must embark on the same journey he undertook. The new Master is introduced by the retiring Master at court, after which the court's designated killer may strike. The end result proves to the leaders of the world that Sinanju is the power to be sought by every throne. For a reasonable fee, of course."
"Wait a second," Remo said, snapping his fingers. "Those letters you were sending out last year. This is what they were for. That's why that Swiss assassin who was chasing us around during that fiasco with those oxygen-sucking trees had one in his house when we caught up with him. It was an invitation to try to kill me."
Chiun allowed a tiny nod. "The main letters in the larger gold envelope go to the head of the government. Inside there is a silver envelope, which goes to the assassin of their choosing. That man happened to have received an invitation by the German government to enter the contest."
"What about that Afghan who just tried to blow me up? Shouldn't we have had an audience with the head of the Junior Towelband, or whatever-the-hell backward rock worshipers we've installed to run that dump now?"
"As I said, the Afghans deviated from the rules," Chiun replied with distaste. "Hardly a surprise. Those people have been in a state of decline ever since Mongol rule fell apart in the hundred years after the death of Genghis Khan. Their deception has lost them the chance to participate."