Chapter 4
The girl extended her index finger and said, “Huff... huff... You there! Hand that hawk over to me! I’ll pay you handsomely.”
The girl, who had climbed higher into the mountains than I’d expected, was trying hard to hide the fact that she was out of breath, but there was no helping the slight rise and fall of her shoulders.
“......”
I’d just been hit with the absurd suggestion that I sell the Baekdu Cheongak-eung I’d caught a moment ago, but I only stared at her blankly.
My eyes moved from top to bottom.
Skin as pale as jade, almost impossible to believe she’d come from rugged Liaoning Province.
Beautiful sky-blue hair that hadn’t picked up even a speck of dirt despite the climb, gleaming as if washed clean by the mountain air.
Features still young, yet already carrying an air of haughtiness and refinement.
And then there was the clan emblem engraved on the hilt of the sword at her waist.
She matched the original illustration exactly, down to the last detail.
The girl standing before me now was one of the heroines of My Murim Academy.
Her name was—
“Moyong Yehwa.”
I murmured her name before I could stop myself.
“Hm? You know me?”
When she realized I recognized her, Moyong Yehwa’s eyes widened, and then she smiled with a soft, pleased little “hoho.”
“Well, of course. It’s only natural that someone would recognize me, Moyong Yehwa, Liaoning’s greatest beauty and greatest warrior, just as naturally as the sun rises and sets.”
I hadn’t said a word, but she was already stacking up every possible flourish and coming to her own conclusion.
“Ooh...”
Watching her, I couldn’t help admiring her.
Part of it was just seeing someone I’d only known from a screen in the flesh, sure, but to throw out lines that shameless while remaining dead serious...
Only a noble lady like her, the precious daughter of the Moyong Clan, could pull that off.
Actually, if it was the Moyong Clan, they were basically in the Northern Duke’s position, so calling it shameless self-flattery would still be a factual statement.
That was what I was thinking as I nodded to myself.
Clack— tap, tap—
Then the Baekdu Cheongak-eung perched on my shoulder pecked at my hair and tugged.
“Brrrrr.”
Its look practically said, She just said she wanted to buy me. Why are you standing there like an idiot?
“Oh, right, she did say that.”
I’d gotten distracted by meeting a heroine in the flesh and forgotten for a second.
“Kkaw.”
Annoyed by my lack of concern, the Baekdu Cheongak-eung let out an offended cry.
Don’t get huffy. As if I’d ever sell you.
“Yes, exactly. Hey, like I said earlier, sell me that hawk.”
Snapping out of her self-admiration and remembering her original purpose, Moyong Yehwa said, “If you know who I am, then you know this is an opportunity you can’t afford to miss.”
Moyong Yehwa placed one hand over her ample chest and spoke with obvious confidence, but this wasn’t just empty boasting.
The Moyong Clan was a family that controlled the trade routes of Liaoning and the surrounding region.
And because of their geography, they traded almost exclusively with Joseon, which meant their profits must have been monstrous.
Why was trade with Joseon so profitable?
Because, man, hadn’t you heard of Joseon ginseng? Joseon. Ginseng.
It was a well-known fact—even in the Goguryeo Subakdo—that uncivilized Central Plains barbarians were obsessed with Joseon ginseng, grown fat on the vital energy of the Korean Peninsula.
The only one of the Five Great Clans that could even compete in wealth with the Moyong Clan was probably the Sichuan Tang Clan, with their monopoly on brocade.
And now that illustrious young lady of the Moyong Clan was offering to buy the Baekdu Cheongak-eung for a fat sum.
For ordinary people, that’d be a chance to get rich overnight.
But there was one problem.
I have no intention of selling.
It wasn’t even that I was strapped for cash. I simply couldn’t sell it to her.
“A trade with me, Moyong Yehwa? I can’t tell whether this is a dream or reality. But it’s reality, so don’t worry—gaaah... eek!?”
Still going on with her dramatic self-important nonsense, Moyong Yehwa suddenly let out a shrill squeal that no proper young lady should ever make and jumped back in shock.
“Hey, your black hair...!”
Thud—! Tap—!
She retreated with a nimble backward step and pointed at my black hair.
“T-that sword! That cloak! Don’t tell me you’re the Great Swordmaster...!”
“Oh. So you finally recognized me.”
As soon as Moyong Yehwa realized who I was, I casually lifted my bamboo hat.
We’d only met a half-interval ago, and only now did she catch on. Guess the Baekdu Cheongak-eung had been her only interest after all.
“How are you here...!”
Moyong Yehwa growled like an angry kitten—
Click—!
—then immediately put her hand on the hilt of her sword.
So she really was the Liaoning’s greatest warrior type, huh. Her stance was pretty solid.
“Ahem. Moyong lady. Calm down.”
Drawing like that against one of the Seven Martial Stars when she was still barely at the level of a baby beginner was basically a mental disorder, so I stopped her.
“Shut up! Enemy of Young Lord Yeon!”
Moyong Yehwa ignored me completely.
She’d been there the last time the protagonist got beaten to a pulp.
She’d dueled him during the entrance exam, gotten absolutely wrecked, and now she was hopelessly smitten with him. In her eyes, I’d look like her mortal enemy.
Looking at her like this, I understood why she was here when she shouldn’t have been.
She came to score points with the protagonist.
The protagonist getting injured was prime territory for the heroines.
There’s a chance to get ahead of that bitch!
When a person is hurt, they naturally become drawn to whoever takes care of them.
The heroines whose eyes lit up at that event usually split into two camps.
One camp stayed by his side and nursed him.
The other ran off to fetch medicine or nourishing food to help him recover.
Moyong Yehwa was the latter.
Just handing him medicine isn’t as good as making something nourishing myself.
If there’s someone you’ve got your eye on, seize their stomach first!
By that logic, she’d put the information network of her family’s merchant house, the Seolha Trading Company, into full operation and searched for the finest ingredients.
That must be how she got the information about the Baekdu Cheongak-eung and ended up here.
For the record, in the original story, she was the one who made Baekdu Cheongak-eung into three-spirit soup.
That was also why I wasn’t selling it to her.
“Piiirrrr!”
Maybe it was a beast’s instinct.
The Baekdu Cheongak-eung bristled its feathers toward Moyong Yehwa and growled.
A heroine’s homemade cooking...
The daughter of the Moyong Clan personally climbs a mountain, gathers ingredients with her own hands, and then, with fingers that have never had to touch so much as a drop of dirty water, clumsily tries to cook.
Caught you!
Ahhh! I, I cut myself...!
Oh, no! Fire!? Water! Water!
Even after she somehow, through all manner of mishaps, managed to finish the dish, she still wouldn’t let it show in front of the person it was meant for.
For the daughter of the Moyong Clan, this is only natural!
Far from it, she’d brush back her hair with a proud little toss and beam at him when he marveled at the unexpected side of her.
All while secretly bouncing with joy inside, ignoring the cuts on her fingers from cooking.
I felt sorry for the Baekdu Cheongak-eung, but just imagining it was enough to make me think...
“...cute.”
Man, I’m jealous of the protagonist bastard!
“Hic!”
My sudden confession attack made Moyong Yehwa hiccup.
I’d meant that as a thought, but it had slipped out loud.
“Cu-cu-cute!? W-what are you talking about!?”
“Ah, no, that’s not what I meant. You misunderstood.”
“You were here before me, and you’re the one holding the Baekdu Cheongak-eung...”
I tried to explain, but she was looking at me like I was some lecherous pervert.
“So it was true! You were after Liaoning’s treasure, Moyong Yehwa! You wanted my body!”
“What?”
“You’ve finally exposed the dark intentions hidden beneath your black hair!”
“Dark intentions?”
Moyong Yehwa went pale.
Her home province of Liaoning was a borderland, full of frequent contact with foreign peoples like the Jurchens, Mongols, and Joseon folk.
Actually, “contact” made it sound too polite. Except for Joseon, which counted as an ally, raids and attacks by the Jurchens and Mongols happened practically all the time.
They’d come riding in with black hair streaming behind them and loot everything in sight.
Food and weapons, sure—but people too.
And the worst of it was when they stole people, especially women.
Having once taken part in rescuing women who’d been captured, she had seen it with her own eyes.
Uuuunngh...!
I, I lived my whole life not knowing this... I’ve wasted half my life...!
Aheee...
Women whose lives had been ruined beyond repair by black-haired men.
“Ugh... You black-haired people’s specialty is that sort of thing, isn’t it? You’re trying to make me bear your child willingly, you little [pure love] fiends...! How would I not know your scheme..!”
The childhood trauma that had been sleeping in the corners of her mind began to stir, and Moyong Yehwa almost had a fit.
“Moyong lady. Sure, I’ve got black hair, but I’m not Jurchen or Mongol.”
Twenty years into possession, I knew roughly what kind of bastards the black-haired types around here were.
But the ones who’d pioneered that brave new frontier of [pure love] were Jurchens and Mongols.
They were nothing like those sun-darkened freaks who rode horses across the plains day after day!
“A Joseon man like me doesn’t do that kind of thing.”
...Probably.
I’d never actually been to Joseon yet, but I trusted the roots of my own people.
And this young lady was the daughter of a family that traded with Joseon, so she’d know better than I would.
“Joseon...?”
The word seemed to work, because a flicker of interest lit up Moyong Yehwa’s eyes.
She had heard that Geom Mujin was from Joseon.
“...Is that true?”
“Of course, I—”
As I started to answer her suspicious question, I paused.
Am I really Joseon?
Up until now, I’d been saying I was from Joseon as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, but now that she’d asked, a sudden doubt crept in.
My soul was definitely Korean-made, but my body had an unknown country of origin.
Judging from my hair and eye color, I’m probably pureblood, though.
Unfortunately, the transmigration gacha had rolled a catastrophic failure, and I’d started life as an orphan, so I had no idea.
Gasp! This isn’t what matters right now!
Snapped out of my sudden existential crisis, I realized my mistake too late.
The hesitation had been only an instant, but in this situation, even that was enough.
It gave Moyong Yehwa more than enough time to let her imagination run wild.
“Kyaaah! R-raped by a black-haired barbarian...!”
“No, you little idiot!”
Apparently she thought I was trying to deceive her, because she completely lost it.
“The Moyong Clan would absolutely turn you into a machine for having children!”
“Ha...”
Her shameless nonsense was so embarrassing it made the listener want to die, and I could only give a dry laugh—
Then, all of a sudden, my body shot forward.
Whoosh—!
Closing the distance in an instant, I appeared right in front of Moyong Yehwa.
I immediately reached out, grabbed her shoulder, and yanked her toward me.
“Kya, kyaah!?”
She stumbled and was pulled right into my arms, startled—but there was something far more alarming than that.
“Hup.”
Holding her against me, I swept my hand through the air.
Thud, thud, thud-thud-thud—!
A violent gust of wind rose up, and with the pressure of it, arrows rained down to the ground all at once.
Wait, hold on. Arrows?
Seeing the wickedly sharpened arrowheads, Moyong Yehwa finally came to her senses.
“What is this all of a sudden...?”
“I can see you. Come out.”
My tone had changed so abruptly from my earlier flustered state that it was almost like a different person was speaking as I addressed the forest.
.....
When there was no response, I zeroed in on the target.
“You there, the one sending hand signals to your men. Come out while I’m still talking nicely.”
He probably thought he’d hidden his presence well, but not a chance.
I could even feel the tension in his throat as he swallowed.
“I know there are twenty more of you besides him, so don’t waste my time. The first one who runs dies first.”
Narrowing my eyes, I let out a blade-like killing intent.
Flinch—!
The opposing side’s panic became palpable immediately.
“I’m counting to five. Make a smart decision. Five...”
As I started counting, the hidden enemy in the brush swallowed hard.
In that brief span, he was probably trying to think of some way to escape this crisis—
“Four three two one, ding!”
“S-some kind of mistake seems to have been made..!”
It was only five seconds, but with the addition of a “ding,” the countdown somehow turned into two seconds flat, and the man sprang out like a startled dog, abandoning all thoughts.
Dammit, bastard! You said five seconds! Five seconds..!
The man clenched his teeth and hurried to apologize, and I tilted my head.
“Huh?”
He’d done emergency treatment with hemostatic medicine and bandages, but there was still a fresh trace where his ear had been torn off not long ago.
He was the scout leader from the Baekmun Escort Agency.