The Soft Glow of Moonlit Skin
Silky hair cascaded over her shoulders, glowing with a faint, ethereal light. Her skin, smooth as white jade, shimmered pale as moonlight. The body she now possessed was so breathtaking that even the most legendary beauties would lower their eyes in deference. Large, clear pupils gleamed like black gemstones, framed by long lashes that cast seductive shadows. Beneath a straight, elegant nose, her lips were plump and red, evoking a soft, inviting fullness. Her figure was voluptuous yet impossibly slender, as if it could be encircled by a single hand. The curves were perfect, the kind that might collect rainwater in their hollows. Her legs stretched long and straight, comprising nearly half her height.
‘Haa…’
Cold air slipped between her thighs, making her body tremble involuntarily. Even though she had absorbed the extreme cold poison and transformed her body, she had not yet reached the realm of immunity to cold and heat. The air here simply no longer felt like poison to her. Every step caused her legs to brush together, sending shivers of ticklish sensation through her. It seemed it would take quite some time to grow accustomed to this awkwardness.
‘Why… like this…’
Pain surged through her with every footfall. Considering the floor of the blood valley was more frozen mud than gravel, it was absurd. She was as fragile as a newborn infant, and the unfamiliar sensations of her body made it difficult to maintain balance. With each step, her narrow waist swayed, her breasts jiggled, and she struggled to stay upright. Her legs had become so impossibly thin that she doubted they could even support this form.
She gritted her teeth and endured. When she slipped in the mist and tumbled across the ground, greater agony followed. Wounds tore open. Blood flowed.
‘This isn’t some sort of bone-marrow cleansing or body reformation. But I have to do this with this body…’
A low growl echoed from beyond the fog. It was the monster that had fled earlier. Reluctant to abandon its prey, it had been circling the area. Red eyes, coarse fur, fangs bared. A foul stench assaulted her nose.
She tried to crawl away. Though she had somehow obtained a healthy body, she could not sense any proper internal energy within it. The beast closed the distance in an instant. Its front paw slashed across her arm, spraying blood. She stabbed at its eye with her nails.
“Grrraaah!”
The creature recoiled, but even with one eye injured, it showed no intention of fleeing. Instead, it snarled with rage. Soon it charged again. As its paw flew toward her, she threw herself forward. But perhaps she had underestimated its cunning—the beast sank its teeth into her leg.
A sickening crunch of bone.
“Aaaagh!”
She could not hold back the scream. Even through the pain, she managed to strike its snout. The beast suppressed a whimper and retreated. She crawled onward. Blood soaked the ground. The cold numbed her body. The cold poison seeping into her wounds seemed unwilling to adapt to her transformed form.
It drew closer again. She wished it would let its guard down like before, but now it approached with clear wariness, growling. She clenched her teeth and dragged herself across the ground. She could not die yet.
The beast lunged, clearly aiming to tear out her throat.
“Hah!”
She swung her arm on pure reflex. The profound sword techniques she had honed over a lifetime flowed into that strike. Her soft hand plunged into the creature’s gaping maw. A sticky, yielding texture met her fingertips. Just before its jaws snapped shut, she gripped whatever she had seized with all her strength. Whether it was the uvula or the tongue, she could not tell in her panic.
“Krrgh…!”
The beast let out a bewildered cry and opened its mouth again. Seizing the chance, Un-hyeon yanked hard on what she held.
“Grrk…?”
The revolting stench of innards flooded her nose. She realized the creature could not endure this. She planted her feet against its body and thrust both hands deep into its throat.
“Die…!”
This was an opportunity that would never come again. At last, a horrific sensation of tearing flesh reached her fingertips. The beast, overwhelmed by a pain it had never experienced before, tried to stagger backward. But that was its fatal mistake. Since she had no intention of releasing its uvula, the retreat only helped her.
“Kyaeng!?”
Only then did the monster realize its terrible error. It belatedly raised a paw to kill her. But by then, an enormous quantity of blood was already gushing from its mouth. Its front paw fell limply. Gurgling and vomiting blood, the beast’s eyes lost focus in an instant.
“Huk… huk…!”
Un-hyeon hurled the foul, blood-soaked clump from her hand. The entire sequence of actions had nearly drained what little strength remained in her grip. Trembling, she examined the beast. It was unmistakably dead.
“I was lucky…”
No matter how profound the strike infused with a lifetime of insight, it had been delivered from a body no different from a newborn’s. The fact that it had landed precisely inside the mouth was nothing short of a miracle. Moreover, if the creature had simply clamped its jaws shut, the ensuing struggle would never have happened.
“I have… no strength left.”
Gurgle—
Now that the life-or-death fight was over, hunger came crashing down on her. How many days had she been unconscious? Even back in the Murim Alliance’s prison, she had not been able to eat properly.
Suddenly, her eyes fell on the massive chunk of meat lying before her. It reeked terribly, but there was nothing else nearby that could serve as food.
“…”
She picked up a relatively sharp stone.
Several more days passed.
Un-hyeon wandered the Yeon-yeon Blood Valley wearing crude rags made from the beast’s hide. She needed to find a way out, yet no matter how far she walked, she could not locate an exit. What was worse, bizarre monsters blocked every path, making passage impossible. Once you entered certain areas, there was no leaving again. The old village legends flickered through her mind.
‘I need to find a place where I can train in peace…’
Her physical condition was far too unstable. If she could continue practicing the Reverse-Blood Divine Art, perhaps something would come of it. But she could barely manage sleep, let alone training. For days now she had been moving with only shallow rest, never daring to lower her guard. Because her body was so frail, there were times she would unconsciously drift off and wake with a start. If her luck had been even slightly worse, this life would have already ended.
The one fortunate thing was that, thanks to the power of the Reverse-Blood Divine Art, her wounds healed quickly simply by breathing the air here. She would not die from shredded soles that prevented walking, nor from injuries sustained in battle with beasts reopening.
“Ah…”
How long had she walked, her feet blistering and healing over and over? Despair filled her eyes.
“Master.”
She had returned. To the place where Wi Cheong-ran’s mummified remains had been left behind.
While she shuddered in momentary despair, something flashed through her mind. Even though it had become a mummy, why was her master’s corpse still intact? And why, when her body had transformed and she had awakened here, had she opened her eyes in a location where the remains were no longer visible?
‘I cannot simply leave it like this.’
Un-hyeon bowed deeply and approached the mummy. When she touched the tip of her master’s hand, it felt like touching deadwood.
“!”
Just as she was wondering how to properly handle her master’s remains, the body suddenly began to crumble. Startled, she pulled her hand away, but it was already too late. Once started, the collapse did not stop. It only ended after Wi Cheong-ran’s body had completely vanished. All that remained in the spot where her master had been was a single set of shackles.
‘So you held on until the very end…’
Un-hyeon bowed once more toward the place where her master had been. Then something strange caught her eye. A small map had been carved there.
“Where… Ah, this place.”
Even smaller characters were written beside the crude map. They indicated the approximate location and what lay in other areas. But how could someone shackled have drawn such a map?
‘This must be a place where a natural formation occurred.’
Judging from the anomalies of the Yeon-yeon Blood Valley, it was clear a natural formation had manifested. Beasts that did not behave like beasts. Extreme poisonous fog. A space from which one could never escape no matter how far one walked. When she had looked down at the valley from the mountain ridge as a child, it had seemed like a place one could traverse from end to end in a single day. Yet she had already walked for days without being able to leave. That was only possible within a formation.
Perhaps Wi Cheong-ran had noticed it even while bound in shackles and had tried to map the area using her senses, all for the sake of a future escape.
‘For now, let’s head to the places Master specially marked.’
Her master had marked several locations and added notes. She had written that the energy in those places felt special. Of course, “special” did not always mean positive.
‘It could be where those beasts gather… or an actual execution ground… something like that.’
Therefore she did not allow herself much hope. If one lived too filled with hope, one would fail to notice the omens of misfortune.
“Damn it…”
Thinking of her family made her chest ache again. In frustration, she slammed her fist against the ground. Her fragile hand tore open instantly, blood dripping. It would heal quickly anyway, saturated as it was with the valley’s cold poison.
She worried she might end up walking in circles again. With that concern in mind, Un-hyeon headed toward her destination. Strangely, in this direction, the starving beasts rarely appeared. There must be some secret here.
“It’s different…”
When she sensed she was nearing her goal, the surrounding environment changed. In a place that had been nothing but dirt and rock, plants began to appear. In other words, this was an area where the cold poison of the blood valley had weakened. Normally one might think she was moving toward the outskirts, but—
‘According to the map, this is not the outskirts.’
Unless the map had been drawn incorrectly, this place was actually closer to the center. The cliff she had jumped from must have been at the very edge of the valley. Whether the location was exactly the same, she could not be sure.
“Ugh?!”
And when she finally reached her destination, Un-hyeon could not help but catch her breath. Nausea surged up so violently she could barely breathe. It was a prison. It was not the same as the one where she had been locked up, powerless, while her family was driven to death. But this, too, was a prison.
“Ugh!”
In the end, she could not hold back the vomit. For a long time she retched everything inside her.
“Huu… huu…”
Even afterward, the nausea did not subside. And with it came bitter regret for her own weakness.
‘Let’s go inside first…’
Whipping her trembling legs into motion, she headed deeper into the prison. Step. Her soft feet touched the artificial floor. Shivering at the cold sensation so different from dirt paths, Un-hyeon continued forward.
Just as she had feared, the interior of the prison was littered with skeletal remains. Bodies with tattered, worn-out clothing, not a scrap of flesh left on them. Like her master, these were facilities that had clearly stood for decades, perhaps even centuries. Maybe this place had been built before the valley was even called Yeon-yeon Blood Valley. That would explain why the poison here had grown stronger and the site had been abandoned. If so, there was little point in searching further—
“Who is it?”
“…!”
A voice came from deeper inside. Un-hyeon kept her guard up and moved toward the sound.
“Light footsteps. A child, perhaps?”
It was a remarkably clear and beautiful voice. She did not sense any hostility. However…
“Oh my, what a pretty child.”
The owner of the voice suddenly revealed her face. Un-hyeon reflexively swung her hand. The woman easily caught it and smiled gently.
“Did I startle you? I have no ill intentions, so please be at ease.”
Soon her face emerged fully from the darkness. Contrary to her lovely voice, she was a middle-aged woman with an extremely haggard face.