The history of the Sungmuiga clan begins with its first head, Lee Hyul-hyun.
However, just as there are no surviving records about the founder, Lee Hyul-hyun, there also aren't many records about the Sungmuiga from that time.
In fact, even among scholars who study the history of the clan, there was speculation that although Lee Hyul-hyun led a faction, he may not have called it "Sungmuiga."
The name "Sungmuiga" itself only began to appear in ancient records starting from the generation after Lee Hyul-hyun.
In other words, it was Lee Hyul-hyun's children's generation that began to be known to the world under the name Sungmuiga.
The one who truly brought the name "Sungmuiga" into the world and established the form of a noble house:
The second head of the Sungmuiga, Lee Hyang-seon.
And now, he has appeared before me.
"..."
I took a deep breath to calm my pounding heart.
This was a tomb prepared for my ancestor.
That meant the person before me must be none other than Ancestor Lee Hyang-seon.
'But how, exactly…?'
He looked so lifelike, as if he might move at any moment.
It was impossible to believe that this was the corpse of someone who had died over a thousand years ago.
There was no presence or energy emanating from him, yet it wouldn't have been strange if he were still alive.
I once again took a deep breath and examined the ancestor sitting before me.
He was seated on the floor, with only his right knee drawn up to his chest.
His right arm drooped limply over his knee, and he cradled a sword, still sheathed, in his arms.
'Not an illusion or a spirit…'
His remains definitely existed right there.
I slowly infused mana into my "demonic eye."
Whirrr…
A twilight-like aura shimmered over my vision.
Only then could I fully take in the burial chamber.
It was at least five meters in width, length, and height.
And on the walls of this vast space were countless talismans, golden threads, ritualistic murals, and magical patterns.
'What in the world is this…?'
My demonic eye deciphered their meaning.
They were part of a kind of seal.
Something was being kept from escaping this room.
'But what exactly is this seal restraining?'
I traced the faintly remaining flows of mana and spiritual power with my eyes.
All the talismans and patterns converged in one direction and ultimately focused on a single point.
The center of the room—right beneath where the ancestor was sitting.
'A hole?'
There was a bottomless pit, like a well, under where the ancestor sat. He was seated on a lid covering the hole.
Thump!
My heart pounded wildly.
That was it.
The strange sense of danger I had felt ever since entering this place.
The source of that feeling was down below.
Crack!
As if it had been waiting for my arrival, the seal's already weakening power finally snapped.
"What the he—"
I couldn't even finish my sentence.
Whooosh!
A black mist, like a dark fog, erupted from the hole and engulfed me in an instant.
And my consciousness faded into the distance.
***
The air rippled.
I felt my body sway as I slowly opened my eyes.
A mirror stood before me.
It was one I had seen often.
The mirror placed in my room at the family estate, the one I used to adjust my outfit before going out.
In it was the reflection of a small child.
No—too mature to be called a child, but the figure, curled up and wounded, looked undeniably like a child.
"..."
The reflection was me… but also not me.
It was a past version of me.
A former life.
A powerless version of me, who had only ever been trampled on and had everything taken away.
My consciousness began to blur, like sinking into a deep swamp.
I tried to keep my mind sharp, but a tidal wave of memories overwhelmed me.
The scene continued.
"What the hell is this!?"
I was in my mid-teens—a trainee back then.
The "me" of that time was curled up in a corner, being beaten by other trainees.
Every detail of that place rushed into my mind: the scenery, the scent of the air, the sound of training beyond the wall.
"You bastard born out of wedlock! Acting all high and mighty when you can't even do anything!"
"If you crawl between our legs, we might forgive you! What, can't you understand plain words, young master? Hahaha!"
Back then, I was simply confused.
What wrong had I committed to deserve this?
How could I possibly escape this situation?
I could feel the emotions I had at that time vividly.
At too young an age, I learned that no matter how much I tried, some things simply couldn't be changed.
Still, I didn't stop training.
But even as I trained, I knew that my reality wouldn't change.
"You can't even use mana properly, and you call yourself a direct descendant? Pathetic bastard."
One of the cadets sneered and threw a punch.
My head snapped to the side from the blow.
"It hurts."
It was a painfully realistic illusion.
No—more than an illusion, it felt like a memory replaying.
Gradually, the line between my past self and my present self blurred.
I could vividly feel every scent in the air, the appearances of the cadets, and even the pain in my body.
Wham!
A cadet's kick sent me rolling across the ground.
As I staggered back to my feet, the scene changed again.
My nanny, sitting in front of me.
Tears welled in her eyes as she applied medicine to my wounds.
"Young master, I believe in you. You are someone of worth."
She used to tell me that all the time.
Even in the midst of hardship, her words gave me strength.
And then—
"...Thus, Mun Ga-hwa, nanny to the ninth son Lee Cheol, is hereby dismissed. This is an official order from the Elder Council. You should be thankful we're ending it here."
"Th-Then what about our young master…?"
"You're no longer part of this house. It's none of your concern now."
A baseless accusation was pinned on my nanny.
The charge: embezzlement.
They claimed she embezzled the family's support funds that were meant for me.
It was absurd.
There were no two words more incompatible than "nanny" and "embezzlement."
But I couldn't do anything.
It wasn't that I didn't try.
I rebelled, I resisted—but nothing changed.
Effort doesn't always bring results.
And there's nothing more hollow than making an effort and seeing no result.
That day, I felt the helplessness of being unable to protect what was mine.
I never heard from my nanny again after that.
BZZZZT!
The world shifted.
Now I was in a chaotic administrative office.
It was my uncle Lee Tae-hong's office as General Overseer.
Papers were scattered everywhere, and my uncle was bound by enforcers.
"...Don't worry. Do you think your uncle will fall so easily? I'll be back. In the meantime, tidy things up for me."
But I knew he would never return.
By then, I was already old enough to understand just how terrible helplessness and misery could feel.
But again, I could do nothing.
I crouched to pick up the papers scattered on the floor.
BZZZT!
As I stood back up, the world changed once more.
A dim room.
Sitting before me was my eldest brother, now middle-aged.
In my hand was a borrowed-name bank account with a small amount of money, and a document detailing an escape route.
"Leave. I'll do what I can to cover for you, but as long as you're blood of the Lee family, they'll keep hunting you. I sincerely hope you can reclaim your life."
I couldn't protect my nanny, who was like a mother to me.
I couldn't protect my uncle, who was like a father to me.
And in the end, I abandoned even my name and fled like a criminal.
I wandered from place to place.
Flinching at every footstep beyond the door of some inn, constantly feeling as if I were sinking into a deep swamp.
I had no one.
No name.
No life of my own.
The life my eldest brother wished for me—did not exist.
Not long after, I heard news about the escalating battle for family leadership.
"The third brother made his move. You should hide for now. We won't be able to contact you for a while. Just hang in there—I promise I'll…"
After that message, I fled to the haven of drifters.
A city filled with smugglers, junkies, and killers—I lived quietly, holding my breath.
But in the end, I couldn't escape the family.
The visit of a Spirit Blade Corps member.
And eventually, the new family head was the third brother.
WHOOSH!
And finally, the scene unfolds.
I was in the uncharted frontier.
With the corpse of a massive monster behind me, surrounded by the remains of my broken sword and blood-soaked earth, my body slowly grew cold.
"To think the bloodline of the Lee family would be this disgraceful."
It was the moment I lost everything—even my own life.
These memories were the trauma of my past life.
They were the most vulnerable parts of myself, buried deep in my unconscious.
They were the kind of memories no human could ever deny or escape—the most fatal echoes of the past.
And once again, the world changed.
Blood was splattered everywhere, and cold, lifeless corpses lay scattered on the ground.
I, too, was bleeding, standing atop those bodies, looking down at them.
But those corpses were not the faces of the people I had known in my previous life.
Aunt, Lee Seohyun, fellow cadets, Jung Jinsu, Valerie...
All the bonds I had built after returning—fallen there.
I slowly rose from the pile of corpses.
"So…"
These were my traumas—the fears I carried.
And so.
I scoffed and continued.
"I don't know what you're trying to prove by showing me all this."
The traumas of the past—the memories I had lived through—no one knew them better than I did.
Those memories remained a painful reality, even after I returned. They were inescapable.
That's why I never once turned my eyes away from them.
Because those memories made me who I am now.
It was to prevent anything from ever being stolen from me again that I fought.
It's because of the pain of my past life that I exist as I am now.
That's why even this forest of corpses before me did not faze me.
This was a scene that would never be allowed to unfold.
Because I will never let it happen.
I was certain of it.
Bzzzt!!
The moment I finished that thought, the world in front of me began to glitch like an old TV screen.
"Ugh!"
It felt as if someone was grabbing my head and shaking it violently—I was dizzy and disoriented.
Like riding a rollercoaster, all my senses were flipping and swirling.
Memories of the past and illusions of the present overlapped and repeated, flooding in and receding again and again.
Crash!
In an instant, the world I was seeing shattered like glass.
The entire scene broke apart and scattered like shards.
Reality or illusion?
What was I even seeing?
Amidst all the confusion, a dark mist began to creep through the shattered fragments.
'That's it.'
I knew instinctively.
The being sealed in the tomb—it was this black mist.
It squirmed and pulsed like a hive mind.
I hurriedly activated my Mystic Eye to peer through the mist.
And what I saw was something I had never seen before.
'What in the world is that…?'
A beast? No, a person? No, neither. A monster? A spirit?
It was a force that defied all explanation.
All the characteristics I had ever seen with the Mystic Eye were mixed together in it.
As I stared at it, I bit down hard on my lip.
It was different, yet I recognized a power frighteningly similar to it.
Black Qi.
That black mist was the source of the illusion I had just witnessed.
And the moment I made that connection—
The darkness around me began to close in again, as if to swallow me whole.
Like a snake slithering up my body, the black mist constricted me from head to toe.
Pain exploded in my head, as if it were being split open, and again, all sorts of memories surged in like a tide.
And then—
Guh!
As if it could wait no longer, the Black Qi burst out from around my heart.
The moment the Black Qi surged forth, the darkness that had bound me was cut away.
Crunch! Rip!
A sound like something being bitten and torn apart echoed endlessly in the pitch-black dark.
Before long, the feeling of being entangled like a vine disappeared.
Boom!
The dark world began to crumble from its edges.
On the other side, I could see the tomb chamber I had first entered.
And within that shattering illusion, I saw a mysterious scene.
"Someone must be prepared to act for future generations. Please seal me with it."
It wasn't my memory. It wasn't my voice.
Snow-white hair. Pale brown eyes.
A sword cradled in his arms, wearing ancient robes.
Lee Hyangseon, the second head of the Soongmu family.
It was his memory.
[T/L: Read extra chapters on my ko-fi page "Pokemon1920" : https://ko-fi.com/pokemon1920 ]