Kang Yoon-ho successfully settled into the Yichang Tea Bookstore and secretly sought out the branch of the Salmak according to the methods he’d heard.
Kang Yoon-ho asked So-hee to deliver a letter, but the closed group of Salmak, knowing he wasn’t one of their own, rejected his request because the location of the letter’s intended destination was top secret.
Eventually, what he could learn while negotiating with the Salmak branch was just that they would send a brief report about their current situation.
A brief report sent from the Yichang branch.
That report hit Cheon So-hee’s head harder than any blunt instrument.
“I heard you work as the manager at a bookstore called the Tea Bookstore in Yichang.”
It was unbelievable news.
Cheon So-hee’s mind was filled with shock, and she could hardly hear what her teacher was saying—someone who had read the report beforehand.
“Is Oppa living with a girl?”
Who? Oppa.
With whom? A girl.
Why? ……Why?
Cheon So-hee could do nothing but ask herself again about the unbelievable news.
“How can this be! I could expect cheating, but living together already? Yukiko! I can’t hide the shock of the adult stairs! Nin-nin!”
Cheon So-hee blankly watched the 6th assassin, who had sneakily glanced at the report, clutching his forehead and spinning around in exaggerated gestures.
How could an ordinary man and woman live together without getting married? She couldn’t understand it. How could such a thing happen?
Cheon So-hee had never once shared a different room from Kang Yoon-ho while living together, but that fact didn’t matter to her.
Childhood friends. Reverse Heaven’s Decree and Heavenly Killing Star. A man and woman promised a future. There’s no reason not to live together. It was absolutely natural.
Even if promises were made, men are known to want to pluck the flowers right in front of them.
Could Oppa really?
“Oppa wouldn’t do that.”
The words that came out of her mouth were incredibly firm.
Despite the shocking news, Cheon So-hee didn’t feel anger or betrayal toward Kang Yoon-ho. No, rather, her faith in him remained unshaken. The Kang Yoon-ho she knew was definitely not that kind of person.
Something must be wrong. Something else must have made Oppa live with someone.
That’s right. If there’s a problem, it’s the girl he’s with.
“Lady Tang.”
She must be the problem. Who could she be? Is she from the Sichuan Tang Family? That name sounded somewhat familiar. Cheon So-hee stared intensely at the name Lady Tang.
Who are you?
Why are you living with my Oppa?
Oppa made a promise for a future with me.
Who are you to be with the man I love?
If Cheon So-hee could kill the name Lady Tang with her glare, it would have been dismantled in an instant.
Dark, sticky emotions began to seep out slowly from the chest of the Heavenly Killing Star.
“Yukiko! There’s a level of madness reaching the Heavenly Killing Star! Yukiko! I can’t face the insane 5th assassin! I’ll prepare the Escape of the Cicada Technique!”
The 6th assassin frantically warned Cheon So-hee, who was beginning to succumb to the sticky, unpleasant emotions.
“That’s not it at all.”
This wasn’t the usual murderous intent.
Anger surged up. But the murderous intent of the Heavenly Killing Star wasn’t in control of her entire body. Cold yet hot, hot yet cold. It was a strange feeling that was thick and sticky, quietly boiling up.
Cheon So-hee racked her memory for that unfamiliar yet familiar feeling.
Yeah. It felt similar to the emotions she experienced when her Oppa talked about the woman who taught him the Tonap method.
Cheon So-hee’s emotions were jealousy born from love, but since she had only felt it once, she found it hard to express clearly.
“Just looking at your face, I feel like I want to run straight to Yichang.”
Dan Seo-wol had already anticipated this reaction, so she chuckled softly, watching her disciple’s face filled with jealousy.
“……..”
Can I go? Cheon So-hee bit her tongue and didn’t deny her teacher’s words.
I want to see Oppa. I want to ask Oppa why he’s living with a girl. I want to know what kind of girl she is.
But she absolutely must not go.
If she couldn’t hold back her feelings, she might never see Oppa’s face again. She absolutely must not go to his side.
The Heavenly Killing Star pressed her lips together as if enduring the pain of patience.
“I knew you would feel that way, which is why I requested additional reports. Read the second report.”
One bad piece of news and two good pieces.
Cheon So-hee began to read the good piece of news that her teacher handed her.
“Lady Tang. Purple hair and green eyes. Appears to be of Tang bloodline. She was chased out of the Seong Family due to an incident instigated by the Heavenly Killing Star. Seong Family’s Seong Hwa-rin?”
Cheon So-hee’s eyes widened slightly as she called the name again, feeling it was familiar.
“Do you know her?”
“I know her. I’ve seen her.”
Cheon So-hee recognized the name due to her assassination mission targeting the head of the Seong Family. On the first day she infiltrated the Seong Family, she had seen Seong Hwa-rin pouting at the client.
“Apparently, there was a power shift due to the incident you caused, and she was chased out all alone.”
“Because of me?”
“Ah! Is this the karma I’ve heard of? The technique of revenge that takes the culprit’s man and claims him as one’s own?”
“Seol-ja.”
Cheon So-hee called out Yukiko’s real name in a chilly voice.
“Hey! What did you just say? …Ugh! I’m sorry! This time, it was Yukiko’s fault!”
Seol-ja lowered her head and admitted her fault, looking at the icy stares between the master and disciple.
“If you had seen it in person, you’d understand quickly. Read the report below.”
“From the jawline to the whole body, there are discolored spots like skin diseases, so she always keeps covered.”
Cheon So-hee recalled the girl she saw in the Seong Family. Although she tried to cover it with a veil, it wasn’t in a state that should be seen by others.
Oppa is living with a woman who isn’t beautiful but has a skin disease?
“Ugh! There’s no way he would date someone like that when he could have a woman with a beautiful face and a stunning body like the Heavenly Killing Star!”
Seol-ja offered soothing words to ease Cheon So-hee’s heavy heart in an attempt to make up for her mistake.
‘Could it be that Oppa has some other circumstances?’
The weight of the boulder pressing down on her heart became a little lighter.
“While it’s written in the report, there’s something I learned about Lady Tang while dealing with the Seong Family.”
“What is it?”
Dan Seo-wol quickly grasped her disciple’s subtle change in emotion and began to reveal what she had learned.
“I heard that Lady Tang has amassed a significant debt. With your brother’s help, she managed to keep the bookstore, but she still has the debt. So she’s not living together in the bookstore; she’s sharing a living space while managing the store together.”
She has a lot of debt and is sharing a living space at a large bookstore.
The teacher spoke cheerfully about what she had found while investigating her disciple’s love life.
“I understand what happened. But you could have told me that earlier.”
The connections weren’t hard to guess. The same man who had embraced her even while trying to kill her. He met and helped a woman in trouble, and he cleared his difficult life as a matchmaker to become the manager of the bookstore.
It wasn’t a romantic cohabitation; they were fellow merchants living and working together under the same roof.
Even Cheon So-hee could understand that much.
“There’s no better news in this dull Salmak than your love affair. If it’s revealed too easily, it wouldn’t be fun.”
If her disciple hadn’t picked up the bad news, Dan Seo-wol thought she would have been disappointed.
“……..”
Cheon So-hee glared at her teacher with dissatisfaction.
“You seem to feel a bit relieved now. Well, you’ll be even more relieved upon receiving this news.”
Dan Seo-wol handed her disciple the third piece of news.
“What is this?”
“This is a piece of news directly sent by your brother.”
No way. It was a move she couldn’t see with her own eyes. Dan Seo-wol admired as she saw the note disappear from her own hand.
Jeok Na-chal watched as her disciple handled the note more carefully than any precious treasure, slowly unfolding the folded part with great intrigue.
“Hey, So-hee. Thanks to my new friend, I’ve managed to settle down in Yichang and achieve a small success. I’ll do my best to keep my promise to you.”
Just a line or so of a note.
It was Kang Yoon-ho’s note, expressing his joy after continuously succeeding with “The Rise of the Tang Family” and receiving permission to bring the hard-to-obtain volumes 1 and 2 to the Salmak.
Oppa.
It’s his style of speaking. She can feel Oppa.
Cheon So-hee read the contents once, twice, then kept reading as if savoring it.
“There’s a book written by an unknown author shaking the entire Yichang at this bookstore called the Tea Bookstore. It must be your brother’s skill.”
Upon hearing her teacher’s words, he said he would succeed through writing. It wasn’t hard for Dan Seo-wol to realize the identity of the mysterious author.
“Seems like the friend mentioned in the note is Lady Tang!”
“Yeah. If a man were really cheating, he would have avoided mentioning another woman. But from the way he spoke to you, it seems like he’s just thinking of her as a business partner or at most, a friend.”
Although how a woman thinks about a man is another story entirely. Dan Seo-wol deliberately chose her words carefully to reassure her disciple.
“I’ve never heard of a cheating man being the one to bring up the topic first!”
In fact, at the time Kang Yoon-ho sent the letter from Yichang, he considered Lady Tang as a friend, so he didn’t have any particular hesitations when writing a note to Cheon So-hee.
Cheon So-hee continued to gaze at the note.
It was a misunderstanding.
Just for a moment, she doubted her Oppa, who was doing his best for her.
“Oppa. Yoon-ho Oppa.”
Cheon So-hee called out her brother’s name, clutching the note to her chest.
She knew how hard he struggled with the matchmaker work; she knew all of it. He didn’t have a lot of money.
He had said he wanted to succeed through books. He must have wanted to work at the bookstore. Just how much hard work had he put in to get that position?
Yet still, Oppa would have continued to try to keep his promise for her.
Oppa has been thinking about her all this time. He’s writing for her sake.
And he’s achieved a small success.
The emotions that were quietly boiling in her heart quickly transformed into comfort and relief.
“Oppa. You’re keeping your promise.”
Cheon So-hee gently embraced the news sent by Yoon-ho.
Oppa is moving forward.
How could she have doubted such an Oppa? Cheon So-hee sank down in a mixture of admiration for Oppa and self-reproach.
“5th! Are you really going to cry? If you get angry and then cry, your butt will get smoky!”
————
“Am I pretty……?”
The next day, the Heavenly Killing Star quietly murmured as she touched her face.
The questions were resolved, but an uncomfortable feeling remained. She said they were friends, yet it felt strangely unsettling. Cheon So-hee, not realizing it was a woman’s intuition.
“Were you worried about whether you’re pretty or if that Lady Tang is pretty?”
A familiar voice echoed from above.
“You? Where did you appear from?”
“That doesn’t matter! Yukiko! The uncertain 5th is frustrating! Look in the mirror!”
“Why the mirror?”
“I hate to say this, but Heavenly Killing Star! I’ve never seen a more beautiful woman than you in all of Joseon! You think some weird-faced woman will steal the man heaven has ordained for you?”
Yukiko, looking unimpressed, put her face close to the mirror.
Indeed, the reflection of Cheon So-hee in the mirror was beautiful. Though buried in the snow during a harsh winter, she would soon finish her struggle and blossom beautifully like a flower bud.
Cheon So-hee had never given much thought to her appearance, but with Yukiko’s praise, the strange anxiety that had been piercing her heart filled up, and confidence began to surge.
Let’s forgive Oppa for eating half an egg. Cheon So-hee thought to herself.
“Are you still worried like this? 5th?”
“No.”
“If you are worried, I have a method for you.”
“A method?”
“Are you willing to learn the seduction techniques of the Dongyong female ninjas?”
As Seol-ja made an unexpected suggestion to the frustrated Heavenly Killing Star, urgent news was flying in from Yichang.
