283. East, Yue Kingdom (10)
Ever since he was young, he had often been told that his brain was extraordinary.
Compliments were always preceded by expressions such as, “He is the son of a peasant.”
The son of a tenant farmer.
At the time, he didn’t understand what it meant, but as time passed, he soon realized.
Land was needed for farming, and my parents were not rich enough to have large and fertile land.
The place where they were farming was someone else’s land. Strictly speaking, it was the owner’s land.
Thanks to you, I was able to realize early on that the world revolves around a round object called money.
Every time my father looked at me making something in the warehouse, he said, ‘If only this father had had more money, she would have sent you to school.’ He used to lament.
I didn’t think much about him.
Because I couldn’t change the environment in which I was born and raised.
‘Biryu, what did you make again?’
‘Farming will be easier if you have this item.’
‘Huh, how do you use this item?’
I lived in a shabby warehouse, making things that would help my parents farm.
One day, I woke up to a foul smell that assaulted my nose.
It was my first time smelling a bad smell, but somehow I felt like I knew its identity.
Spicy blood scent.
I had not wandered around the battlefield or engaged in a bloody fight as a warrior, but I could at least recognize that it was the smell of human blood.
I left the house and immediately made eye contact with an unidentified man.
The corpses of his parents were visible around the man in black who was standing under the dark sky.
Not only the bodies of my parents, but also the corpses of village residents were seen here and there in the farmland behind them.
‘There was someone still alive.’
‘……’
I couldn’t answer the man’s question.
‘A young child who is not afraid even after seeing the death of his parents. ‘He’s in a bad mood.’
‘……’
The reason I didn’t answer wasn’t because I was embarrassed or scared.
If everyone in this village is dead, who will own that fertile land?
I was thinking like that.
Dead people do not come back.
The only ones left in this miserable world are the survivors.
‘I know a guy with a twisted mentality like you. ‘Would he follow me if he had nowhere to go?’
The name of the man who reached out to me is Guhwi.
It was a ‘blood demon’ that I had only heard about through rumors.
From then on, I became involved in a blood religion.
The ‘master’ I met after entering the blood religion taught me a vast amount of knowledge, starting with tactics and strategies, such as the functions of the blood stones he studied and the blood of monsters with unique properties.
Although I was not able to study face-to-face with the teacher because he was also busy with work, he was a good teacher.
Then I heard the news that he had died.
Since I was young, my emotions were ambiguous, so it was difficult to understand the thoughts of the religious leader who was laughing like crazy while looking at the sky.
I just had similar thoughts to ‘back then’.
Then who will sit in the empty military seats?
The correct answer was determined.
Even though I knew, I had doubts.
I was promoted to a position as a soldier for the Blood Cult overnight and was suffering from a never-ending pile of work.
“Phew… Master was handling many of these matters through letters…”
It wasn’t until late at night that I was able to stretch my legs and stand up.
However, that leisure was short-lived when someone knocked on the door.
“Come in.”
“…Soldier.”
It seemed quite uncomfortable for the people of the blood religion to refer to him as a soldier, who was still just a young boy.
But I couldn’t show any discomfort again. Those people who did that died yesterday morning with their limbs torn apart in front of everyone.
“What’s going on?”
“As you ordered, I have captured several humans needed for the blood sacrifice.”
“Really? Then put a necklace on him and lock him up in prison.”
“What do you mean by necklace…?”
“If you go to the warehouse, there will be a spare necklace left over from what you sold to the pig from Wolguk last time.”
“Is that necklace enough? I don’t need to be shackled…”
“That’s enough. The necklace itself must be seen as a shackle. Don’t make me say it twice.”
The necklace, made of bloodstone, is imbued with powerful blood magic, and if the order of the person in charge is not obeyed, the chain of the necklace will tighten around the wearer’s neck, causing the wearer to lose his or her life.
It is less powerful than the blood magic that is engraved directly on the body, but it is simpler and allows for more diverse commands to be given.
It was an object created by combining the teacher’s research and my own research. As for the bloodstone, the remnants left over from the cult leader’s drinking were sufficient.
The power of the bloodstone was powerful.
The possibilities of the blood-colored stone were truly endless, but it was an unexplored field that had not been properly researched because it had long been used as an elixir by blood magicians and blood cults who had disturbed the world.
But in my case it was different.
There is no way that a word like ‘illegal’ could be used to stop the people of the blood religion who are already posing a threat to the entire East.
I focused on the attribution of the sword made of bloodstone.
I ended up making it.
A necklace that is not only impossible to take off, but also unbreakable no matter what impact is applied, making it almost like a slave contract.
“No matter what happens, you won’t be able to take off the necklace, so don’t worry.”
I waved my hand to send the unknown subordinate away and immediately finished reading the paper I was reading.
This was the last letter the Master sent to me.
‘Among the cadets, there is a young man of unusual ability with the nickname Paradise Exile… I can’t shake the feeling that he has been ruining my plans. He’s moving as if he’s looking straight into my head. So, we plan to get rid of him as soon as possible. It may not be easy to kill a cadet when the instructors’ eyes are wide open, but I can’t shake the intuition that I shouldn’t just leave it like this.’
The writing is so scribbled that you can feel the panic. At the end of the letter, there was a sentence that was difficult to overlook.
‘He is the spark that will one day engulf the blood religion in flames.’
Only then was I able to be sure.
Paradise Exile.
It is clear that he is deeply involved in the death of my teacher, Wei Zihan.
***
“Could you please give it to me for a moment?”
“I don’t like it. Why should I give what’s mine to you?”
“……”
“Are you coveted? Do you covet? Kick…”
Geum Dawn, who had difficulty standing on her own feet because all of her tendons were severed, makes a fuss while holding her necklace with a red gem.
There was something different about her from the Golden Dawn I had met in the shadow of Shedi earlier.
It is presumed that Geum Dawn, who used up the power of her urethra by unblocking her bloodstone necklace, was temporarily consumed by the ghost contained in her urethra.
“hehehe… It’s mine. It’s mine.”
How on earth can a bound item be stolen?
Anyway, let’s put off getting the necklace back from the distraught Geum Dawn for a while.
“Hmm, now that I think about it, I don’t think I’ve heard your name yet.”
I asked Seo Cho-ryang’s subordinate, who was dumbfounded as the bloodstone necklace came off my neck so easily.
“…It is called Maddeok.”
“I would like to congratulate you on becoming free, but it seems difficult to say that you have completely escaped the clutches of Seocho-ryang just yet.”
“…It sounds like you’re planning to use me as a double agent.”
“I don’t want to draw Seo Cho-ryang’s attention already. You don’t need to dig up any information. The necklace has probably lost its effectiveness, so you won’t have your life threatened by Seo Cho-ryang if you wear it again.”
“…Looking at that, I think your guess is correct.”
Ma Deok’s gaze was directed at Geum Yeo-myeong.
Geumyeomyeong ‘Should I give it or not?’ She was teasing me with words like this and was repeatedly putting her necklace on and taking it off around her neck.
“I have more questions than that. What does it mean that I am not even in Seo Cho-ryang’s thoughts?”
“I don’t know the details, but I know you’re not the main target.”
“Then Seocho-ryang’s main target is…”
“It’s the female cadet who was with you. Her name must have been… Kaen…?”
“…Why are you saying that now?”
“That’s because I never asked.”
“I see. Then…”
“I don’t know the reason. The leader of the group knows that. The leader is a general of the Yue Kingdom named Yasui. Wasn’t he attacked by thieves on his way to the Yue Kingdom? That was also Yasui’s doing.”
Maduk, who stopped speaking, neatly summarizes what he wanted to hear.
Yasui.
It’s a name I’ve never heard of.
Even if I saw it while playing a game, I think I might not remember it.
‘That means he wasn’t a major character…’
Sierra soon responds.
[ Yasui…? Is this really the Yasu the woman knows? ]
He is an acquaintance of Sierra.
I think I’ll have to listen to the story later.
“What’s surprising is that there is no necklace hanging around Gyo-hak’s neck. It’s hard to believe that a guy who knows what honor is would voluntarily follow Seo Cho-ryang.”
“Thank you for providing the information.”
“So when will I regain true freedom?”
Ma-deok dusts himself off, stands up, rolls around on the floor, and takes the necklace from the hands of Geum Yeo-myeong, who was playing with it.
“My necklace… It’s my necklace…!”
Geumyeomyeong threw him into Shady’s shadow before it could get any louder.
“……”
Maduk lost her words as she looked at the golden dawn being swallowed up by her shadow.
It seemed like he had a lot of questions, but he didn’t ask any specific questions. She does not hate people who know the beauty of silence.
I answered his question with a bright smile.
From noble mtl dot com
“Until Seo Cho-ryang dies.”
***
After talking with Maduk, I was heading straight to Kaen’s place and was listening to Sierra’s explanation about the person named ‘Yasui’.
[ Yasui was like my real sister. ]
When I heard the story, it was said that Yasui was Sierra’s younger sister who had been with her since childhood.
At Sierra’s home family, which ran her dojo, she occasionally took in orphans who had lost their place, and Yasui was one of them.
However, I haven’t seen him since I left my hometown.
[ I don’t understand unless it’s a character with the same name. The Yasui that her real wife knew was a guy who always pursued the right path and wanted to follow her straight path. ]
Well, even if you don’t understand, he was a person under Seo Cho-ryang.
I think this is probably the biggest obstacle in my plan to get rid of Seocho-ryang.
If it’s not the necklace’s fault, it becomes even more difficult to deal with. This is because the military power of a country’s generals can never be ignored.
A member of the blood religion who made the bloodstone necklace.
Yasui is believed to be Sierra’s acquaintance.
And even Seo Cho-ryang is targeting Kaen for some reason.
I was about to set out to find Kaen, slowly sorting out the complex information that had flowed into my head.
Not too late, Kaen’s presence reaches me.
It wasn’t that difficult to find her room. She thought that if she wandered around the hallways of her dorm and spread her energy around, she would be able to find it.
The fact that Kaen’s presence could be felt here meant that nothing special had happened yet.
However, she needed to make sure that she was also being watched.
Kaen stood in front of the door of her room and dispersed her energy again.
Three unknown figures.
‘As expected, there is surveillance. There are more.’
It was a number that could be used not only for surveillance but also for other purposes.
At that time, I was standing in front of the door for a moment and wondering what Seo Cho-ryang was aiming for.
ㅡKwak.
Suddenly the door opens.
“Cadet Zeto…?”
As she opened the door and came out, her doubts were shed.
Now that I think about it, she was able to sense her vibe.
“…Didn’t you call me?”
When she didn’t answer with her mouth tightly shut, Kaen, who was tilting her head, asked me a question again.
Her wet hair, as if she had just come out of the wash, was giving off a sweet scent.
It seems that Kaen understood my mood as a secret knock.
After a short period of thought, I opened my mouth.
“I want to talk for a moment. Can I come in?”
“…Is it my room?”
“……”
As I smile without answering, Kaen lets me into her room.
I decided it was right to stay by Seo Cho-ryang’s side right now since I couldn’t figure out his plan exactly.
Meanwhile, a blush stains Kaen’s cheeks as he lets me into the room.
In the middle of the night, a woman brought a man into her room.
I knew very well what this meant.
But there were three viewers, no, five viewers, including Maduk, who had joined the guys who were watching Kaen under the pretext of spying on Sierra and me… What she was expecting seemed unlikely to happen.