Chapter 47 No sooner had Namgung Jeok-myeong finished speaking than he guided Yeo Il's hand forward.
At her fingertips, she felt the hard frame of bones.
Emaciated.
For the body of a martial artist—one once called the Sword King—it was pitifully thin. Even his breathing was so faint that one might doubt whether he was truly alive.
His skin was as dry as tree bark, and a foul odor lingered. Even with careful tending, his back would surely be badly pressed and bruised.
"In truth, Father is merely clinging to life. It has been… a very long time since I last met his gaze and exchanged words with him. For Hui-myeong, it has likely been even longer."
After confirming the slow pulse as well, Yeo Il used the paper and brush she had requested from Namgung Jeok-myeong.
After a short silence came the answer.
"Because of you, Namgung Soyo."
"Hah."
After the dry laugh, a heavy silence settled once more. Perhaps because of the dry and dim air of the room, the silence felt especially long.
After some time, Namgung Jeok-myeong posed an unexpected question.
"What is your real name?"
"..."
"I am not trying to investigate you. What I am about to tell you is an utmost secret of the Namgung Clan, unknown even to my younger brother. It feels uncomfortable to reveal it to someone whose name I do not even know."
Calmly, Yeo Il wrote her name.
"You are not Soyo."
"..."
"You play with words."
Namgung Jeok-myeong did not deny her certainty.
So long as it did not disadvantage her.
"You turned the Namgung Assembly into chaos and speak so boldly."
Judging by the light snort that followed, he did not trust her goodwill, though he did not find her words unpleasant.
"But… yes. Ridiculously enough, in this situation, it seems I do not have many means I can use. Even if that was the scheme you aimed for."
A blatant scoff followed, as if to say that would never happen.
Namgung Jeok-myeong remained silent for a long while before speaking again.
"…Eighteen years ago, when the Orthodox–Demonic War was at its height, a man came to the Namgung Clan. In his arms, he carried an infant."
"Do not interrupt the flow."
Yeo Il debated whether to write Remain silent on the paper when a name he spoke next struck her with no small shock.
"The one who brought the child was Cheon Mu-ryeong. In the world, he is known as the First Evil."
Cheon Mu-ryeong, the First Evil.
That name appears even here.
Yeo Il set down her brush and listened to Namgung Jeok-myeong's low voice.
"At the time, Father was struggling against Ye Gwiryeong, one of the Six Demon Lords of the Demonic Cult, and the Demon Army of the Ye clan under him. Then the First Evil appeared without warning, handed Father the infant, and said—"
[Let it be known that this child is in your hands. Merely announcing that fact will cause Ye Gwiryeong to withdraw quietly.]
"The prediction was accurate. When Namgung Je used the child to demand negotiation, the Ye clan yielded without resistance. Father secretly struck the retreating Demon Army, and thus the Ye clan barely escaped total extermination."
When the Orthodox–Demonic War ended, the only surviving descendant of the Ye clan was Ye So-gun, who remained in the Namgung Clan.
But Ye So-gun could not rebuild her annihilated clan. Namgung Je did not keep the promise to release the hostage in exchange for the Demon Army's withdrawal.
Ye Gwiryeong was certainly dead.
"However, Father… haunted by the specter of a dead man, became increasingly consumed by the fear that Ye Gwiryeong might return alive."
Namgung Je at times suffered delirious episodes, smashing everything in his chamber and even invading the space where the young Ye So-gun slept—no, where she was confined.
[Strangle that thing… crush its throat so it becomes mute. So that it cannot reveal to the world that its father is Ye Gwiryeong!]
He imposed an unthinkable cruelty upon an infant who could not even walk.
[No, no… Even if mute, what use if it can write? Make it blind! It must never recognize Ye Gwiryeong's face until the day it dies!]
Thereafter, Ye So-gun was called a nameless illegitimate daughter and lived as if imprisoned deep within the Northern Hall of the clan for years.
Eventually, driven by mounting anxiety, Namgung Je expelled her and sent her beyond Cheonju Mountain to Henan Province—stringing covert agents from Anhui to Xinjiang to sever all contact between the Demonic Cult and Ye So-gun.
As the saying goes, the guilty conscience pricks its own heel.
Namgung Je feared that if Ye Gwiryeong returned alive, his own children would suffer the same fate as Ye So-gun.
Thus, he kept his eldest son, Namgung Jeok-myeong, constantly at his side and warned him again and again.
[Do not forget, Jeok-myeong. That thing must be killed quietly.]
[Father.]
[When everyone has forgotten its existence! That is the opportune moment. When that moment comes, Ye So-gun—and all who know Ye So-gun—must be erased entirely from this world!]
[But—]
[There is no but! There can be no other answer! If, if the Demonic Cult were ever to learn of Ye So-gun's existence…]
Yet Namgung Jeok-myeong could not bring himself to erase Ye So-gun—no, Namgung Soyo—from the world.
For in his heart remained a compassion that Namgung Je did not possess.
"And at last, you returned to the clan, Soyo."
The tale Namgung Jeok-myeong recounted was of a scale Yeo Il had never imagined.
I thought, at most, that she was the child of an old friend who colluded with the Demonic Cult.
Namgung Soyo.
Her true name was Ye So-gun.
The biological daughter of Ye Gwiryeong, one of the Six Demon Lords of the Demonic Cult, and the final heir of the fallen Ye clan.
Her identity was far more complicated and troublesome than expected.
To prepare for contingencies, it was possible that Namgung Je himself commissioned Namgung Soyo's assassination.
Yet the answer that came overturned her expectations once more.
"No. It is true they target your life, but their true purpose lies elsewhere. Father—what he feared most in his later years… a grand and absurd objective."
There was only one future that Namgung Je, even to the point of losing his sanity, had feared.
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