“Jjamkkkan-!!”
Bin Namgung’s loud shout exploded outwards. If Hong Ryun hadn’t already set up a ki barrier, the sound would have spread throughout the Namgung Manor.
“Sal-seong! Cover the sky with your palms!”
Without hesitation, Hong Ryun who was brandishing her blade, paused her movements at those words.
“At the very least, shouldn’t you keep your word?”
“So I am trying to keep it, aren’t I?”
“Don’t spout nonsense!”
Hong Ryun, whose little hand held a dagger capable of piercing through her own throat at any moment, glanced at Namgung Bin. He began to persuade her with all his might.
Moments ago, he had firmly believed that there was no need to bring up the prepared lines, but now he did.
“I did not intend to kill the Sword Sage!”
“…? What nonsense are you suddenly babbling about?”
“Clearly, you said this! ‘No one other than myself should be given any commissions regarding the Sword Sage’!”
“Did I? Hmm, it seems like I might have…”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Someone who breaks their own words isn’t shameless, right?”
Instinctively taking a defensive stance to protect his neck and vital points, Namgung Bin continued his reasoning.
Pointing out the flaws in Hong Ryun’s past words.
“Hmm… Well, okay, let’s say that’s true. So what?”
“It seems you have a misunderstanding.”
“Misunderstanding?”
“Isn’t this visit related to my dealings with the Lord of Illusions?”
“Yes.”
“Then I was right to assume. Let me make it clear. I did not intend to kill the Sword Sage.”
Though some might dismiss it as wordplay,
” Hmm? I saw the records of your meeting with Lord of Illusions, and I also heard about how Lord of Illusions later gathered the Dongchang and Jin Yi Guards…”
“I did meet with Lord of Illusions, and we did discuss the Sword Sage. But I never asked him to kill the Sword Sage.”
“Then?”
“I merely asked to properly enforce the punishment that everyone had been avoiding for a long time. That’s not a commission to kill the Sword Sage, is it?”
For Namgung Bin, who had fought for many years upholding the righteous cause of the righteous faction, it was the most important and familiar way of solving problems.
Although it was somewhat concerning that with the appearance of Sal-seong, it would now be practically impossible to attempt killing Cheolbin Namgung,
Ultimately, Cheolbin Namgung was only a secondary goal. The true objective was to win over the heart of Soeun Yu.
However, there was one thing he didn’t know.
“Still, what kind of nonsense about ghosts and rice are you talking about?”
“Step-.”
“Now, just a moment! You clearly only told me not to harm the Sword Sage, didn’t you!”
“Uhh-.”
Hong Ryun, who had taken a step towards Namgung Bin, stopped her pace as if something came to her mind.
Soon after, she displayed an expression of disbelief.
“Exactly, what story from when are you telling?”
“I unmistakably said it. To your subordinate, the White Shadow Assassin King. I clearly said not to touch the Sword Sage in any way. And not to plan anything that would tarnish his honor.”
“…? The White Shadow Assassin King? Why is his story coming up now?”
Namgung Bin’s voice wavered slightly.
A single filament of memory, like a breeze, brushed through his mind.
“Lord, may you forever be at peace…”
That was what the White Shadow Assassin King had left him with, before disappearing a few months prior.
Thinking it was nothing significant back then.
“Could it be… The disappearance of the White Shadow Assassin King was related to something involving you?”
“Disappearance? So this fool is trying to set up a bait. Who’s going to believe someone who claims ignorance?”
“From the beginning, what exactly are you talking about?! Ignorance of what?!”
“Tsk. Acting. There’s nothing to talk to someone like you who only spouts nonsense. You’re utterly deceitful.”
“…!”
Originally, the White Shadow Assassin King should have relayed Hong Ryun’s warning to Namgung Bin, but due to his arm being cut off by Hong Ryun, he ended up perishing in some cave at the hands of the Blood Cult’s Jiangshis.
Apart from the now deceased White Shadow Assassin King, no one in the world knew about this.
And Hong Ryun wasn’t the type of person who would empathetically consider Namgung Bin’s situation.
Shack.
Ssukk.
A small sword wind from Hong Ryun’s dagger split into two and flew out. A crisp sound of a clean strike decorated the air.
Immediately after, Hong Ryun closed her eyes.
Simultaneously, Namgung Bin felt excruciating pain in two parts of his body.
“Kueeeeeuuuk…!”
However, the pain he felt wasn’t solely physical.
First, his ears were ringing.
A sudden pain erupted from the right earlobe, where he had attached a jade accessory just moments ago.
But even that was only a small part of the pain Namgung Bin was experiencing.
“What, what exactly just happened…!”
While suppressing the groans of pain, Namgung Bin struggled to lower his head.
In his field of vision which captured the floor, a severed piece of his ear lay there.
…Naturally, that wasn’t all.
“…Uh, uh?”
A small piece of meat that had fallen between his legs caught his gaze.
At that moment, a high-pitched ringing began in Namgung Bin’s nonexistent ears.
He was that shocked.
“No, this can’t be…!”
Namgung Bin hurriedly knelt and bowed his upper body. The excruciating pain in his groin was unbearable, but physical pain no longer mattered to him.
…
The utmost importance, perhaps even more important than his life, essential to his being…
“Nononononono!!”
For it lay there on the floor.
Even more cruelly and mercilessly,
…the two balls and one column lay there abandoned on the floor.
“Nonononono! This can’t be! All my plans!! Everything I’ve planned so far!!!”
Namgung Bin, who was screaming his soulful despair, heard Hong Ryun speaking gently to him.
“Can’t you see I’ve closed my eyes? Hurry up and crush it and dispose of it.”
Her lack of concern for someone else’s pain was quite assassin-like.
Tragic, indeed.
“No… No, it can still be revived!”
Unable to bring himself to touch the now detached part of his body, which once was precious to him, Namgung Bin muttered incomprehensibly.
It seemed like her words weren’t reaching him at all.
“It’s still… alright. If I master Blood Gong perfectly… Once I reach the Hwa-gyeong level, I’ll be able to reattach it…”
Even going so far as to deny reality and refuse to accept it.
There was nothing he could do.
Namgung Bin’s ultimate goal was to take Soeun Yu away from Cheolbin Namgung and drive the current readers of this story away.
Precisely, by doing so, to instill the readers with the utmost discomfort.
But…
“It can be reattached, it will be reattached. It must be. If things stay like this… If we leave it like this…”
Who could, not to mention someone who couldn’t even walk right, possibly be recognized as a man?
“…No, it can be reattached. Trust Blood Heaven Gong. It stated clearly that when the blood essence arrives, worldly matters will be purified!”
Meanwhile, Hong Ryun was talking to him as if she didn’t care about his situation at all.
To Namgung Bin, it sounded like cruel mocking.
“When do you plan to toss it away? This waiting is going to make my neck ache. Can’t you see I still have my eyes closed?”
As someone who vowed not to see anything other than Namgung Cheolbin’s possession, Hong Ryun maintained her eyes closed in this moment as well.
It went without saying that Namgung Bin had no intention of throwing away his precious part.
On the contrary, trying to revive it somehow, he brought a handkerchief to carefully wrap it up.
“…If you don’t clean it up, I guess I’ll do it for you.”
At that moment, the piece of meat wrapped in the handkerchief was engulfed in crimson flames.
Whoosh!
Hong Ryun, with her eyes still closed, had unleashed the technique of Sammae Jingwa.
“Kueck!”
Clang!
In an instant of scorching heat, Namgung Bin immediately retreated and stumbled.
When he rose again, his precious piece of meat was already engulfed in flames.
Crack, snap.
Golden sparks flew in all directions. Hong Ryun, treating the sparks landing on her body as impurities, swiftly moved to avoid them all.
Of course, throughout this process, she never opened her eyes. Reliant solely on her senses, Hong Ryun was such a supreme master.
“Ah, no! Noooo!!! Nono NOOOOOOOOOO!!!”
Namgung Bin’s testicles and manhood were slowly turning into a pile of ash. With even more desperation in his scream than before, Namgung Bin shouted, but Hong Ryun’s barriers prevented the sound from escaping.
Whoosh whoosh whoosh!
Soon enough, the flames shot up toward the ceiling, consuming everything they could, before fading into the air like vanishing sparks.
It was rather a beautiful sight, but Namgung Bin couldn’t bring himself to say anything.
Even when he wanted to deny reality, the cruelly blackened ashes lying before him and the emptiness of his lower half filled him completely.
To this, Hong Ryun whispered tauntingly.
“Be grateful that I spared your life. If it wasn’t for training my humanity for my destined one, and if I wasn’t abstaining from killing, I would have severed your pig-like head by now.”
“…”
Having said that, Hong Ryun gracefully turned around.
Namgung Bin, who was struck with quite a shock, couldn’t manage to respond with any words.
“Ah, I wonder what our destined one is doing at this moment?”
And as Hong Ryun walked out of the Namgung Manor with a remarkably light step,
Namgung Bin continued to quietly mutter incomprehensible phrases while staring at the ashes that had completely burned.
“Come closer!”
“Guh…! How can I… when I don’t know your identity…”
“What’s important about that in this situation?! Stop wasting time and reveal yourself!”
On the other side of the wall, Yu Soeun, who had been facing off against the Blood Demon, cautiously stepped forward upon hearing her call.
Clack.
Yu Soeun, brimming with tension, turned the corner into the basement.
A red-haired woman came into her large, round eyes.
“It’s you! The wife of the Sword Sage… or rather, the former one!”
“…! How… did your limbs…!”
Seeing Blood Demon’s grotesque limbs, Yu Soeun let out a shocked gasp.
But to the Blood Demon, that wasn’t important.
“Enough nonsense! Can you quickly read that notebook on the shelf over there?”
“Wha- What? No, tell me first who you really are! How dare you be lurking here in our family basement in such a state!”
“Stop your chatter! Before Namgung Bin arrives, quickly read that notebook! Can’t you see you can help with that much?”
Blood Demon’s voice brimmed with anticipation.
Her gaze persistently pointed to a specific section of the bookshelf.
Even though Yu Soeun, who sensed the mysterious woman’s presence didn’t lower her guard, her curiosity was piqued by the Blood Demon’s demeanor.
“Is this what you mean? But Namgung Bin, the Patriarch… is he involved in this place? Could it be… were you imprisoned here by the Patriarch?”
Swoosh.
While continuously asking questions to the mysterious woman, Yu Soeun reached for the notebook on the shelf.
The journal of Namgung Cheolbin, which was respectfully placed in a corner of the basement, trembled under her touch.
