I Know. I Know All Too Well (1)
"What... do you mean?"
"I said I wish to see the head of the Jinju Eon Family."
"..."
"Should I be more blunt?"
"..."
"I have something to say to the last descendant of the Jinju Eon Family, Lady..."
Thwack!
Mid-sentence, the master of Jinju Pavilion threw a punch at Han Cheong-un.
It was a reasonably heavy and disciplined strike.
However, it was far too slow and weak for Han Cheong-un to let it land.
Without even needing to raise his spear, Han Cheong-un caught the fist with his bare hand.
"Ugh..."
The master of Jinju Pavilion strained to push his fist forward, but it was futile.
Whether he pushed or pulled, Han Cheong-un did not budge an inch. Holding the fist in place, Han Cheong-un let out a sigh.
"It seems you have trained your external martial arts diligently, but your internal energy cannot keep up."
"Urgh..."
"It is a pity. To think this is the Eon Family Fist that once ruled the Jianghu..."
Han Cheong-un sighed in disappointment.
At that, the master of Jinju Pavilion gritted his teeth and roared.
"Shut up!"
He grabbed his own wrist with his other hand, pulling back with all his might to finally wrench his fist free.
He glared at Han Cheong-un and spat.
"Who are you? Are you a lackey of the Five Great Clans?"
"Well, that fellow over there is a direct descendant of the Sichuan Tang Family."
Han Cheong-un pointed at Tang Jin, who stood behind him with his arms crossed.
The master gritted his teeth even harder.
"Even after a hundred years, you still seek to hunt us down? You cursed wretches of the Five Great Clans!"
"Calm down. He may be from one of the Five Great Clans, but I have nothing to do with them."
"...What?"
"I came here to offer my help to the Jinju Eon Family."
"..."
"I know your circumstances, so I understand your reaction. But is it wise to start a fight without even distinguishing friend from foe? For now, try trusting me."
"Why... why should we trust you..."
"That is entirely up to you."
"..."
"Whether you trust me or not, the choice is yours. I will respond accordingly."
Anguish and conflict washed over the face of the Jinju Pavilion's master.
How should he take this youth's words?
Blind trust was out of the question.
A century had passed since the downfall of the Jinju Eon Family.
To survive, they had to doubt and doubt again. That was the only reason they had managed to preserve their threadbare existence.
Trust? That was a luxury reserved only for those with power and leisure.
"We..."
"Were you looking for me?"
Just as the master of Jinju Pavilion was about to speak, a clear, beautiful voice cut into their conversation.
And the one who appeared was...
"Oh..."
A woman of such breathtaking beauty that an exclamation slipped from Tang Jin's lips before he could stop it.
When she stepped forward, Han Cheong-un clasped his hands politely and spoke.
"Are you Lady Eon So-hui of the Jinju Eon Family?"
"..."
She let out a soft sigh.
So he even knows what I look like.
He might have guessed from the atmosphere, but it didn't feel that way.
This young noble had looked at her and identified her with absolute certainty.
There is no point in introducing myself as Jang Mun-hui now.
She smiled bitterly, clasped her hands, and replied politely.
"Yes. I am Eon So-hui of the Jinju Eon Family."
"My Lady..."
The master of Jinju Pavilion spoke in a worried tone.
At that, Jang Mun-hui—no, Eon So-hui—spoke.
"Steward Jang. It is fine, do not worry."
"But..."
Eon So-hui addressed the master of Jinju Pavilion as "Steward." That was likely his true identity.
A loyal retainer who serves even a century after the clan's downfall... Impressive.
Perhaps because he also belonged to a martial clan, Tang Jin nodded in quiet admiration.
Han Cheong-un clasped his hands again.
"I am Han Cheong-un, the Sect Leader of the Extreme Dao Sect."
"It is a pleasure to meet you, Sect Leader Han. Shall we... move to a more private place to talk?"
"Very well."
Han Cheong-un readily agreed to her request.
The place where Eon So-hui led Han Cheong-un and Tang Jin was...
"Is this perhaps your bedchamber, Lady Eon?"
"It is the most secure place in this entire building."
"It certainly seems that way."
They had passed through more than five locked doors on their way here.
The adjacent rooms on both sides were completely empty, likely left vacant on purpose to prevent eavesdropping.
Eon So-hui personally poured tea into their cups.
"Any conversation we have here will not leak to the outside."
"I see. Thank you for the tea."
As Han Cheong-un calmly accepted the cup and took a sip, Eon So-hui smiled gently.
"You drink without the slightest hesitation."
"Did you poison it?"
"Oh? Would it have been fine if I did?"
"Please spare me."
"I know."
As she spoke, Eon So-hui cast a brief glance at Tang Jin, who sat beside Han Cheong-un.
Her look seemed to say: How could I possibly use poison in front of a member of the Sichuan Tang Family?
Tang Jin felt strangely uncomfortable under her gaze, but he remained silent and drank his tea.
Then, with a smile so beautiful it could bewitch anyone, Eon So-hui spoke.
"May I ask you a question, Sect Leader Han?"
"Go ahead."
"How did you know our true identities?"
"..."
"Is it perhaps a difficult question to answer?"
It was difficult. Extremely difficult.
I can hardly tell her I'm a regressor...
It was a massive headache.
The Jinju Eon Family.
This clan was once a prestigious noble family so powerful that they split the Hebei region's influence in half with the Hebei Peng Family.
It was said that if the Eon Family Head had wished it back then, they could have easily expanded the Five Great Clans into the Six Great Clans.
However, just as every clan has its golden age, a decline is inevitable.
A succession feud erupted within the Jinju Eon Family.
While such conflicts were common in any martial family, the struggle within the Eon Family was exceptionally severe.
A fratricidal war broke out among the siblings, ending in bloodshed and drastically weakening the clan's power.
Seizing this opportunity, the Hebei Peng Family struck the Jinju Eon Family.
They fabricated various excuses, but the real reason was simple.
One mountain cannot hold two tigers.
There could only be one ruler in Hebei.
The Peng Family's true desire was to avoid sharing their territory with another clan in the limited region of Hebei.
The weakened Eon Family collapsed all too easily. Banished from Hebei, they were forced to endure years of hardship.
The other four great clans initially watched from the sidelines, but eventually fell for the Peng Family's sweet talk and joined the persecution.
From then on, no matter where they fled, the Five Great Clans joined forces to relentlessly hunt down the hidden survivors of the Eon Family, denying them any place to settle.
The Jinju Eon Family, which had once shaken the Jianghu, drifted across the land like floating weeds until their very existence faded from memory.
People naturally assumed the clan had been completely annihilated. But they were wrong.
Though the Jinju Eon Family had fallen, one last descendant remained.
That was Eon So-hui.
The final heir to the Eon Family bloodline.
She lost her father before she was even born, and her mother died giving birth to her.
It was the loyal retainers of the Eon Family who raised her.
They raised her like their own daughter, constantly reminding her that they were her loyal subjects and she was the last direct descendant of the Jinju Eon Family.
Growing up in such an environment, Eon So-hui naturally came to believe that resurrecting her clan was the most important mission of her life.
But how could she achieve this?
The Jinju Eon Family had already lost most of their core martial arts.
While the training methods for external techniques and forms remained, the vital internal cultivation methods were gone, and the secret ultimate techniques passed down only to the family head were entirely lost.
Without the Eon Family's martial arts, the clan could never truly rise again. What was she to do?
After deep contemplation, Eon So-hui reached a conclusion.
First, I need money. I will rebuild the clan using financial power as our foundation.
Even if it didn't directly rebuild the clan right away, she knew she needed it. Watching her retainers perform backbreaking labor just to feed and clothe her, she had realized the absolute necessity of wealth.
Money is essential. Absolutely essential.
Having made up her mind, she immediately took action.
The first thing she did was sell all the jewelry she owned.
"My Lady, those are..."
"Sell them and bring back the money, Steward."
"My Lady, please reconsider. Those are..."
"This is an order from the Family Head."
Steward Jang hesitated.
The jewelry Eon So-hui possessed was, in truth, the only inheritance left by her late mother.
He could not bring himself to sell it. Looking at the conflicted steward, Eon So-hui sighed.
"I am only pawning them for a short while. I will multiply this seed money several times over and buy them back."
Steward Jang closed his eyes tightly and replied.
"Yes... I understand, My Lady."
Steward Jang wept inwardly as he obeyed the command.
Because of our incompetence, we must sell the late Madam's inheritance... How can I face the ancestors when I die?
But he did not know.
"I just need to earn it back. There are plenty of ways to make money."
He did not know that their young family head possessed an unparalleled genius for business.
First, she gathered information.
Where a famine had struck, where a plague was spreading, where a flood had occurred...
She gathered as much information as possible through the Beggars' Sect.
Then, she bought as many horse carts as she could, loaded them with grain, and sold them in the famine-stricken regions.
In those famine-stricken areas, she purchased medicinal herbs and clean cotton cloth, which she then transported and sold in the plague-ridden regions.
From there, she bought timber and sold it in areas where homes had been destroyed by floods.
By constantly keeping her ears to the ground, she supplied the exact goods needed in the exact places that needed them.
To traditional merchants who only sold fixed goods in fixed locations, her methods must have looked like a dangerous tightrope walk.
A business where a single failure could lead to catastrophic losses was not trade; it was gambling.
However.
"Oh... Oh my..."
"Heavens, how is this possible..."
For a merchant to amass massive wealth, they naturally had to gamble.
Because when such a gamble succeeded, the profits were incomparably greater than those of conservative traders.
Two years after establishing her merchant group,
Eon So-hui had multiplied her initial seed money several hundred times over.
She had not only bought back all of her mother's jewelry, but had also amassed enough wealth to purchase the old Eon Family manor in Hebei. Yet...
"Steward Jang. What do you think will happen if we return to Hebei right now?"
"My Lady..."
"Will we be able to settle down and proudly claim the name of the Jinju Eon Family again?"
"..."
He could not answer. He knew all too well that it was impossible.
Those without power could not even speak their own names aloud. That was the law of the Jianghu.
"We still need power, after all."
They had to recover their martial arts, even if they couldn't restore them to their former glory.
She didn't even dare hope for the secret ultimate techniques passed down to the family heads. Just a decent internal cultivation method would allow them to reconstruct a significant portion of the Eon Family's martial arts.
But how could she obtain such a cultivation method?
Even if I offer a thousand gold pieces, the cultivation methods available for purchase are third-rate at best.
Even if she did manage to get her hands on a superior cultivation method, it would still pose a problem.
If it wasn't acquired through legitimate means, it would only give other sects an excuse to attack them.
She needed to obtain a proper, high-grade internal cultivation method legitimately. To do that...
"I will need even more money."
"My Lady..."
"And... I must pay a visit to the Namgung Clan."
"Yes. I will make the arrangements."
No one questioned her decisions anymore.
Through her brilliant talent and tireless efforts, Eon So-hui had already been fully recognized by the retainers as the true head of the Jinju Eon Family.
Upon arriving at the Namgung Clan, Eon So-hui staked everything on the gamble of a lifetime.
"Would you not like a daughter-in-law worth ten million gold taels?"
Those were the words Eon So-hui spoke to the Family Head of the Namgung Clan, Namgung Hyeon. She laid out her circumstances and proposed her terms.
"What I want is a high-grade internal cultivation method from the Namgung Clan, and your permission for just one of the children I bear to take the Eon surname. In exchange, I will dedicate all my talents to the Namgung Clan and make it the greatest family under heaven."
Eon So-hui had wagered everything.
She sought to strike a deal with the Namgung Clan by offering her talent, her value as a woman, and her entire life.
The head of the Namgung Clan found her proposal intriguing.
"Impressive. You are but a child, yet your spirit is magnificent."
"..."
"It is almost a pity that you were born a woman."
That was something Eon So-hui herself regretted more than anyone.
But it was a reality she could not change. Born a woman, she simply did her absolute best with the hand she was dealt.
I will use their cultivation method to refine our martial arts, and pass it down to one of my sons so he can inherit the Jinju Eon Family.
A child who was both a descendant of the Eon Family and a blood relative of the Namgung Clan.
If so, the other four great clans would not dare touch him. And as their martial arts were refined over time...
One day, the Jinju Eon Family will rise again. It is enough for me to be the foundation for that future.
It was a deal proposed not for her own generation, but looking hundreds of years into the distant future.
Then, the head of the Namgung Clan spoke.
"First, I would like you to prove your worth."
"Prove it?"
"You claimed to be a daughter-in-law worth ten million gold taels."
"Yes."
There was no lie in her words. She was entirely confident she could achieve it.
However, the head of the Namgung Clan demanded proof. His condition was...
"How about starting with one hundred thousand gold taels?"
"One hundred thousand gold taels?"
"Yes. Earn one hundred thousand gold taels within the next two years and bring it to me. If you do, I will give your proposal serious consideration."
"I will do it in one year."
"...?"
"In return, I want a firm promise, not just serious consideration."
"Ho... You truly are an extraordinary woman."
At this point, the Namgung Family Head felt a genuine desire to have her as his daughter-in-law. However...
"Very well. Since you have set such a difficult condition yourself, I will not refuse."
"Yes."
"Good. One year from now, if you show me one hundred thousand gold taels, you shall become my daughter-in-law. Furthermore, I will keep all the promises you requested."
"Thank you."
Eon So-hui clenched her fists tightly.
She had succeeded. She had made it happen.
She had successfully negotiated with none other than the head of the great Namgung Clan.
Would anyone believe it?
That the daughter of the ruined Eon Family had dragged the leader of the Namgung Clan onto the playing field using nothing but sheer audacity and eloquence.