Chapter 201
Chapter 201
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 202
Chapter Title: Servant of the Tang Clan of Sichuan (4)
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Dokgo Jinmuk walked silently ahead, paying no mind to the group following him.
The pavilion floating on the lake gradually emerged from the mist.
There, atop the pavilion, a man leaned his sword against a pillar.
The man he had been searching so desperately for—Yeongcheon.
When they reached a certain distance, the subordinates trailing him dropped to their knees in unison.
They slammed their heads to the ground and shouted slogans that could tear one's ears.
As the noise echoed across the lake, Dokgo Jinmuk ascended to the pavilion and spoke in a cold voice.
“Yeongcheon. I have something to say.”
The sword leaning against the pillar trembled faintly.
Yeongcheon sat motionless with his eyes closed, while Baek Sahyeon, who had been savoring tea beside him, clicked his tongue and murmured lowly.
“Now you should call him the Hyeonhwa Sect Leader. When will you remember?”
The Ming Cult operated under a Six Extremes system.
Since they were six masters bound by profit, none had the right to claim true leadership over the cult.
Thus, the cult was divided into six pillars, with each sect leader building their own power for their ambitions and desires.
They did not always act together. Each had different priorities. Only when an unbeatable foe appeared would they finally unite their strengths.
Among them, the Hyeonhwa Sect led by Yeongcheon had been growing by devouring other factions wherever he passed.
Dokgo Jinmuk snorted.
“Hyeonhwa Sect Leader, huh. I wondered who those weird guides were. Must be your followers.”
He turned back to look at the people still prostrating on the ground.
At that moment, Yeongcheon quietly opened his eyes.
“...”
The instant their eyes met, Dokgo Jinmuk could only be genuinely startled.
It had only been a few months, yet the Yeongcheon he remembered was no longer there.
Even a light joke would feel like an insult under that pressure.
Yeongcheon remained silent.
But that silence felt like a wordless command to speak.
Pushed by the weight, Dokgo Jinmuk continued.
“You must have heard. The results of this Dragon-Phoenix Assembly. Dang Soran, struggling with her heart demon, and Cheongwol, whom we focused on so intently—they took first and second place. Surprising results. And the very thing puzzling you too, Yeongcheon. Why Dang Soran endures, why Cheongwol doesn't collapse...”
Baek Sahyeon's head slowly turned toward Dokgo Jinmuk.
Even Yeongcheon quietly parted his lips.
“Continue.”
With those words, the air in the pavilion grew even tighter.
Dokgo Jinmuk furrowed his brow and murmured lowly.
“I felt that strangeness when facing Cheongwol too. That alien sensation of not crumbling despite the peril... It was as if someone was behind her. So I investigated... and found a man hiding behind both Dang Soran and Cheongwol. It seems he tamed their heart demons.”
“Who is he?”
“A youth called Han Seojin.”
“...Affiliation?”
Dokgo Jinmuk shook his head.
“No affiliation. Looked like a peddler.”
Baek Sahyeon, who had listened to the end, sneered.
“There are hundreds, thousands of men named Han Seojin in the Central Plains, not even a title. How do you expect to find him again?”
“Stay near Cheongwol and Dang Soran, and you'll find him.”
Baek Sahyeon chuckled once more and shook his head.
Feeling it wasn't mere mockery, Dokgo Jinmuk asked.
“...Why laugh?”
Yeongcheon provided the answer.
“We heard about you too. That you attacked the Tang Clan retainers and the nuns of Mount Emei.”
“...That was to bring in that Han Seojin bastard—”
“—but you failed. Now not just Emei and the Tang Clan of Sichuan, but all of Sichuan is on alert. At a time when we need to build strength, your blunder is hindering us.”
Only then could Dokgo Jinmuk more keenly grasp the atmosphere surrounding the pavilion.
Yeongcheon didn't look pleased. Neither did Baek Sahyeon.
He spat out an excuse.
“...Do you really not grasp the power of this information? Two Murim Alliance juniors at the wall of peak—”
“We know. But it's irrelevant now.”
“Yeongcheon, this is—”
“Even thinking about the Murim Alliance keeps me busy enough. Why should I concern myself with some random man?”
“...”
While Dokgo Jinmuk was stunned by Yeongcheon's indifference, Baek Sahyeon chimed in.
“What of it, two juniors? Just kill Cheongwol and Dang Soran anyway.”
“...And if more peak experts emerge starting from those two? The next one might have the makings of the world's best—”
“—Afraid?” Baek Sahyeon asked with a smile.
“If you're that scared, go chase after the man's tail yourself. Seduce or kill that Han Seojin however you like. We're not at leisure to bother with juniors now. We each have our own urgent business.”
“...”
Humiliated, Dokgo Jinmuk slowly descended from the pavilion.
He kept walking until Yeongcheon's followers backed off, then faced his own clinging assassins.
“Gang Leader, what shall we do?”
Unable to hold back his rising irritation, Dokgo Jinmuk whispered.
“Didn't you hear? Call him Sect Leader now. Tsk. Find skilled ones and send them to Mount Emei and Chengdu. Bring that bastard.”
“We crushed and subjugated the Ghost Soul Society this time. Shall we test how useful they are?”
“Do as you will.”
“Yes.”
He needed to prove himself right to Yeongcheon and Baek Sahyeon to ease this frustration.
With a long sigh, he brushed the wound pierced by Dang Soran's dagger.
****
Staying as Dang Soran's servant allowed me to glimpse her daily life in detail.
Within that routine, there were surprisingly many moments that filled me with gratitude.
Observing her up close, Dang Soran was putting in more effort for me than I had imagined.
It went beyond merely stationing many servants to hide me. She had installed elaborate safeguards everywhere to protect me.
Rumors said she was secretly cooperating with the Hao Gate to spread nonsense about me too.
Things like the Tang Clan's retainers and a Leather Room owner from Mount Emei being brutally killed in Dokgo Jinmuk's raid, their graves already built in specific spots.
Moreover, Dang Soran had joined hands with the Beggars' Sect Sichuan branch leader to bring beggars into Chengdu, like setting up a surveillance net on every street.
She provided them food and drink, naturally gaining their cooperation.
The public excuse was that the Demonic Cult had attacked the Tang Clan of Sichuan twice already, so precautions were needed.
The first was the attempt to plant Wi Cheonsang as her marriage partner, the second Dokgo Jinmuk.
But in truth, it was a strategy to protect me more securely, making it impossible for the Demonic Cult to easily infiltrate Chengdu.
The cost must have been immense.
Under Dang Soran's command, Chengdu was turning into a fortress to protect me.
A fortress just for someone like me. How could I not be grateful?
The fear of death I hadn't even realized was fading bit by bit.
It would have been perfect if it ended there, but the problem was that the opponent was Dang Soran.
Proper, calm, and sometimes cheerfully respectable in front of others.
...But in front of me, she was sly, lewd, greedy, and delighted in putting people in tough spots, making it far from easy.
Dang Soran had done all that for me, but in turn, she began demanding payment from me.
That payment was using me to spice up her daily life.
“Ah, so tiring. Really, thinking of Seojin all day and working so hard is killing me. But our Seojin won't even rub my shoulders or do a thing.”
“...”
Even after thanking her dozens of times, it wasn't enough; she constantly boasted to me about what she'd done.
At first it was boasting, but later it turned to plain teasing.
She acted like that precisely because I was at a loss.
“What to do. It's not a small sum. A poor wretch like me can't repay in money. Can't work right now for income either. Hmm... Doesn't our Seojin have to pay with his body?”
“...”
The more I ignored the provocation, the more she escalated.
Dang Soran giggled at my face, then slowly let her gaze drop to my lower body.
After pondering for a while, she twirled her hair and asked.
“...Can I touch your cocky?”
“Have you gone mad?”
I couldn't hold back and shot back.
“Pfft!”
Of course, it wasn't sincere, but she spouted such nonsense every time I didn't react.
It felt like watching a child playing with fire, ignorant of the danger.
She said it knowing I'd refuse, but she could because she didn't know how much of a pervert I was.
“I won't touch, what are you worried about.”
I wanted to crush that arrogance.
Show her what happens when she provokes.
Touch cocky? I could make her cling and beg to stop.
Would I hate it? Honestly, I could do it.
But I held back because that would play right into her hands.
My conviction to do SM play with only one person was bending.
I'd do it with Chaeha. Not Dang Soran.
Not because I liked Chaeha that much, but because I'd decided, and I wanted it that way.
I struggled to calm the thousands of perverse fantasies flooding my mind and said.
“Stop it, really.”
“Stop it, Miss?”
“...”
My insides boiled.
But Dang Soran's logic lingered in my head.
She said the teasing worked because I already saw her as a masochist.
That I no longer saw her as the Tang Clan's Dang Soran.
To not yield to that logic, I calmed my heated heart.
I'm Dang Soran's servant... Dang Soran's servant...
Dang Soran wasn't my masochist; I was Dang Soran's servant...
Dang Soran was the Tang Clan of Sichuan's eldest daughter, one of the Central Plains' rare peak experts, a delicately raised golden flower...
“Miss, if there's nothing else, I'll be outside.”
I smiled brightly and told her.
“Hmm, no. Stay here, our Seojin.”
“Then I'll use the outhouse.”
“...That's no too.”
Hearing that snapped my reason for a moment.
I rolled only my eyes, glared at Dang Soran with a straight face.
Unknowingly asking.
Are you sure you won't regret this?
Dare make me hold my piss?
Only then did Dang Soran rarely avert her eyes.
“Ah, I don't need to go.”
She whispered like an excuse.
“I do, Miss.”
...I didn't really, but you don't decide that.
Dang Soran pondered briefly, then said magnanimously.
“If you walk with me through Chengdu after work at the You hour this evening, I'll let you go now. Young Master must be bored stuck inside the Tang Clan—”
*Thud thud thud!*
At that moment, someone knocked on the door.
Since I was the only exclusive servant attending Dang Soran now, I asked from the door.
“Who is it?”
“It's—it's Dang Yeop!”
A childish boy's voice rang out.
He tried to sound bold, but both Dang Soran and I chuckled at the innocence.
Without waiting for Dang Soran's permission, I opened the door.
*Creak!*
There stood a boy who didn't even reach my knee.
Looking around, his exclusive servant was watching from afar.
The Tang Clan of Sichuan's youngest son, Dang Yeop—even at such a young age, already had his tastes, disliking servants trailing him constantly. Trying to act like a big man, perhaps.
He didn't like being babied.
“Young Master Yeop. Here for the Miss?”
No matter how annoying Dang Soran was, this kid wasn't.
I knelt on one knee and looked down at him.
Dang Yeop nodded.
Then Dang Soran rose from her seat and approached Dang Yeop.
“Yeop. You've come again.”
She flipped on an adult mask in an instant, spine-chillingly.
The brat from before vanished, replaced by a sisterly figure even in my eyes.
“Sis!”
Only upon seeing Dang Soran did Dang Yeop act like a child.
He spread his arms to hug her and smiled innocently.
“Sis! I tossed the shuttlecock today!”
“I told you to call me sister, and it's shuttlecock, not uochim. Was it fun?”
The Tang Clan's lady of the house—Dang Soran's mother—was not in good health.
As a result, youngest Dang Yeop couldn't visit his mother often, and Dang Soran seemed to fill that gap.
Even while struggling with her heart demon, she hid it from Dang Yeop as much as possible.
“Sis. I missed you yesterday. Why so busy lately?”
Dang Soran picked up Dang Yeop and rubbed her cheek against his.
“Our cute Yeop, I missed you too. But sister had work.”
Watching that purity oddly made me feel guilty, so I cleared my throat and said again.
“...Then I'll step out and use the outhouse.”
Dang Soran glanced at me, forgetting her mask for a moment as her face twisted.
But she quickly composed herself in front of Dang Yeop.
She looked like she had much to say but couldn't drop her dignity and nodded.
I left Dang Soran's chambers and walked to the side wall.
There, in the small herb garden I'd set up, I let out a deep sigh.
Really... let me breathe.
“Why the sigh?”
But at that voice, my body stiffened.
I slowly turned my head.
The Tang Clan of Sichuan's Clan Leader, Dang Jeokcheon, was approaching slowly.
For some reason, his eyes brimmed with hostility toward me.
“Safe within our Tang Clan of Sichuan's walls, what worry makes you sigh like that?”
...It brimmed quite a lot.
Fuck. Just trying to breathe.