243. Bloom (2)
243. Bloom (2)
- 1 -
Evening drew near.
The prince stared at the white energy seeping through the cracks in the window.
He didn't bother making a fuss about it this time.
By now, he knew perfectly well whose energy that was.
- Uwoo...!
A high, piercing cry rang through the room.
The white energy swirled, coalesced, and finally shaped itself into a Western Continent beauty adorned in a dazzling Eastern Continent dress.
The dress was rather revealing, but the prince's gaze settled on her face without the slightest waver.
- Our feckless Highness.
Seolhwa's voice was as laced with sarcasm as ever.
The prince brushed it aside with practiced ease and cut straight to the point.
"Did you find her."
Fatigue weighed on his voice, but the obsession smoldering beneath it was plain to hear.
The will to reclaim a lost treasure resonated through every word.
Ever since he'd lost Saya of the Sangoyo, his shadow warrior, anxious days had consumed him entirely.
She was not merely his property—she was also a treasure of the imperial household.
- I found traces. But to follow them, I'll need that meager authority of yours now.
"I suppose I should be grateful you chose not to run wild on your own."
At the prince's words, a smile curved Seolhwa's lips, her eyes swirling with something volatile.
The frenzy whirling within her pupils snagged his attention.
- After all, you still haven't delivered the 'Forbidden One' to me.
The prince met that gaze levelly.
She was a difficult asset to control.
So much so that, had her abilities not been certain and the situation not urgent, he would never have considered bringing her out—prince or no prince.
If this matter ended well, he resolved with absolute conviction to speak to the imperial household and secure better means of control.
He swore it to himself.
- Shouldn't you press her on why she dared betray you?
"Indeed..."
Still, misfortune or not, things were aligning favorably for the moment.
The prince had questions for Saya.
Why she had betrayed him.
Whether her oath of loyalty had been a lie.
How she had slipped the bonds of the Han nation and the Hwa nation.
And whether she had any intention of returning at all.
'If she refuses to come back...'
The prince clenched his fist and steeled his resolve. Determination flooded his voice.
"Let's go."
""Yes, Your Highness.""
At his words, the ten or so martial artists who had been waiting nearby rose as one.
Their appearances were a motley collection.
West and East were irrelevant, and multiple races stood mixed among them.
These were individuals the Han nation had plucked from among criminals and bound with purchased loyalty.
Specialists dispatched to retrieve Saya the very moment the prince's report of losing the 'Forbidden One' reached the higher ranks.
Every last one of them was at least Elite-grade, and among their number were three who had attained the High-rank realm.
'With a fighting force of this caliber...'
Even the royal family of Haisen, if struck by surprise, could be brought down helplessly.
Whatever faint hope Saya might have glimpsed, that hope would—
Cheolkeok.
—never be realized.
The prince confirmed this to himself as he gathered his gear.
Because there was not a single nation in this world that could wholly escape the reach of the Han Empire.
- 2 -
Beneath a sky scattering snowflakes, Seolhwa's blue eyes fixed on a single point.
The Narcissus Palace.
Where her gaze settled, an antique palace came into view—one that had grown weathered from long years without its owner's touch, though recently it had begun to shed that atmosphere of neglect.
The trail she had picked up from Countess Volonte's mansion led straight to this place.
'How in the world did they hide themselves in there?'
Seolhwa twisted her lips into a sharp smile.
The name Amatsu hadn't lost its quality, it seemed.
Whether they numbered one or many, she still didn't know—but the sheer audacity of infiltrating a human royal palace as monsters was extraordinary in itself.
Sarak.
Seolhwa slowly stretched out her hand.
Snow.
Weather that rarely graced Hairausch, where it stayed warm in all four seasons.
To her, this weather that formed part of her new name felt like some sort of omen.
'The weather was just like this back then, too.'
The day the armies of the Hwa nation and the Shin nation surrounded the lands of the Cheoneungcheongu clan.
Seolhwa raised a trembling hand and swept it over her pallid face. A chill radiated from her fingertips.
"Sangoyo..."
Uttering the recognition name Saya had bestowed on her, Seolhwa felt her heart hammer.
Every ounce of obsession and longing bound up in that name had been constricting her heart for all these long years.
The clan of Cheoneungcheongu, the Cheoneung household—now whittled down to fewer than ten members.
The unique 'song' they possessed had been more than enough to enthrall Seolhwa's heart.
'I wanted to become one of them.'
Seolhwa had spent decades trying to win their good graces.
But the clan of Taka Tengu would not accept her, nor would they teach that art to outsiders.
Saya, above all...
"Ha."
The smile that had graced Seolhwa's lips twisted into something uglier.
She had loved her. Fiercely.
And all she had received in return was utter indifference.
So Seolhwa had handed over the Cheoneung household's location.
To the Hwa nation and the Shin nation. Both had been eyeing the family that dominated the Western Continent's skies for as long as could be remembered.
'I intended to seize both in the chaos.'
The song, and Saya herself.
But the clan's end proved far more catastrophic than Seolhwa had ever anticipated.
Because after the joint attack by the two nations, other Demon Realm Archdukes had lent their power from the shadows.
Andras and Gaf.
Back then titled a marquis and a duke, they had wielded human strength to eliminate a rival.
'It was a mistake. A monumental mistake.'
In the end, the Amatsu clan's tengu burned everything they possessed to protect their secrets.
The only one who survived was Saya.
Through all of it, Seolhwa had even allowed herself to be captured alongside Saya by the Han nation—all so she could keep Saya alive and monopolize her.
"I must be the only one you have."
Seolhwa's pupils gleamed with a cold light.
Saya had lost everything because of her schemes.
Did she regret it? No, she did not.
Because Saya, as she was now, remained wholly indifferent to her.
The sole surviving Hawk Tengu.
The last inheritor of the secret song passed down through the Cheoneung household.
Seolhwa's obsession to possess both had edged dangerously close to madness.
"You will never escape."
A blue chill rose from Seolhwa's fingertips.
The cold slowly crystallized into ice, as though giving form to her obsession.
Watching the retreating figures of the prince and the martial artists, Seolhwa's eyes smoldered darkly.
- 3 -
"So."
Listening to Saya's account, I stroked my chin.
Her lips parted faintly, and a sigh not unlike a moan escaped her.
Eyes half-closed, she pressed her cheek into my hand.
The gesture betrayed a faint tremor of bliss.
"You're saying you knew all along."
"Someone who'd been obsessing over me for ages vanished without a trace right before the clan's destruction."
Saya's eyes darkened.
Yet what I saw there was neither rage nor hatred but a quiet sorrow, settled over the long passage of years.
"I realized something was wrong, but by then it was far too late to act..."
"I managed to get as many people out of the household as I could, but they all returned to the clan and died fighting. Those who survived were..."
Her words trailed off. I didn't need to hear the rest to understand.
Herself, and a handful of mixed-blood tengu of the collateral line who had been kept in positions scarcely better than house guests.
Perhaps a few direct-line survivors still existed somewhere in the world—but they weren't anywhere we could find them now.
"In the end, she didn't get what she wanted."
"Master."
"Not the power, and not you."
I smiled.
Silently, Saya lowered her eyes.
"Once I understood I was the one she desired, I concluded there could be no greater revenge than this. In any case, it was a situation where I couldn't kill her directly."
I swept my hand up along her cheek and rested it on her head.
Anger and hatred likely still dwelled within her heart. Yet she had suppressed those emotions for the sake of the most effective revenge possible.
To ensure her enemy would burn with ever greater longing, and eventually go mad.
"Looking at it now, you were quite the splendid schemer."
"It's meaningless to me now..."
"But it's become meaningful to me."
My smile deepened.
Saya's former owner—the prince and bureaucrat of the Han Empire—was now heading straight for this place.
Without even attempting to conceal his presence.
His plan, in all likelihood, was to formally request an audience with Yurena.
A prince meeting a princess was a socially fitting matter, so he certainly hadn't considered that the royal family might refuse.
'But that audience will be refused.'
To this royal house, Yurena was a subject of domination.
They would have no intention of letting a major variable intervene until they were absolutely certain their domination was complete.
And the prince—the Han Empire—did not know that.
Even I couldn't have guessed it before arriving here.
Then again, even if they did know, they might not care.
"What do you think they'll do?"
"Whatever choice they make, they won't back down as things stand."
"That's my read, too."
If they approached cautiously, it wouldn't be a bad outcome for me either.
The roots of the flowers I'd cultivated would only burrow deeper into the royal household, and it would become feasible to detain them the moment they set foot inside the royal castle.
But if matters turned out otherwise...
"I suppose I can test out the flowers I've freshly sown."
When I placed my finger against her lips, she pressed a kiss to the tip before biting it gently.
"It will be as you wish, Master."
Her pupils sparkled.
- 4 -
"The audience has been refused."
The prince frowned at his subordinate's report.
It was the answer they'd received less than an hour after arriving at the royal castle.
"What reason did they give."
"Her Highness Princess Yurena is currently in poor health, making it difficult to grant an audience—or so they said. They made no promise for a later time, either. This is..."
"Yes. A clear refusal."
Because his status ranked high for a bureaucrat, it had been dressed up as a postponement—but there wasn't a single word about when it might become possible.
In practical terms, it was no different from an outright rejection.
"We'll wait two more days, for now."
"Yes, Your Highness."
Seolhwa radiated anxious energy from within the shadows, but the prince ignored it.
He was well aware of the obsession Seolhwa harbored for Saya.
Still, this waiting period was time that would allow him to safeguard his life—at the very least—even if the Han imperial household subsequently piled every last responsibility onto his shoulders.
Time to demonstrate that he had not forgotten proper decorum toward the royal household even in an urgent situation, while simultaneously making them feel he was acting out of sheer necessity.
Of course, for all those conditions to be met, the premise was that they would have to locate Saya within the royal castle—and survive—while carrying out those "unavoidable measures."
But the prince harbored no doubt, at least on that score.
Saya was inside, and they would survive.
"...Hoo."
They waited within the royal castle for two more days.
All the while sharpening their fighting spirits.
In the meantime, the prince paid frequent visits to the palace's audience request office.
Formally entering and maneuvering politically was an entirely different order of difficulty compared to infiltrating and executing an operation.
But perhaps it was only natural. No reply ever came back.
"We can wait no longer."
At last, resolve crept into his voice.
"What are your opinions."
The ten elite martial artists dispatched from the prince's home country lowered their heads.
Murderous intent flickered in near unison across their faces.
"In accordance with His Majesty's command, our sole task is to retrieve the 'Forbidden One.'"
"Then..."
The prince's hand swept up the naked blade of his sword.
The sword hummed faintly, responding to his energy.
Seureureung.
Along with the sound of the prince drawing his sword, a metallic ring that signaled the end of their battle preparations spread through the room.
"Tomorrow at dawn. We move when everyone is at their most vulnerable."
The martial artists' eyes glinted sharply.
And from Seolhwa's blue pupils, a frenzy cold as moonlight rose swift and bright.
The chill moonlight, now stained crimson, blessed the path before them.
As if heralding the fateful encounter that would soon unfold.