Escort
Yeo I-ryeong, the precious and pampered only daughter of Yeo Jong-wi, the head of the Mangeum Merchant Guild, was in an excellent mood.
What she had originally wanted was a man her own age.
A promising young talent from a renowned sect, someone with skill and a guaranteed future. And if he were handsome as well?
Yeo I-ryeong had even dreamed of falling for the man assigned to guard her at first sight, and of him falling for her in return.
How romantic was that?
Probably, any woman her age would have thought of it at least once.
A fated first meeting. A relationship that deepened day by day.
As the daughter of the Mangeum Merchant Guild, a house that poured enormous wealth into the Murim Alliance, it wasn’t exactly an impossible fantasy.
But her father, Yeo Jong-wi, saw things differently.
She was his one and only daughter. He couldn’t just hand her over to any nobody.
Even if the man was a promising young disciple from a famous sect or a prestigious martial family, he was still, in the end, just a martial artist.
No one knew what the future held for such men. Even if they did succeed, they were still people who lived and died by the sword.
So Yeo Jong-wi absolutely did not want his daughter tangled up with anyone from the martial world.
It was a cruel thing to say, but Yeo Jong-wi was a merchant to the bone.
That made Yeo I-ryeong, in his eyes, a top-grade commodity.
Which meant there was no way he would let her go to some mere martial artist.
She needed to be connected to the sons of high officials or influential noble families.
That was why, when he had desperately searched for an escort, Yeo Jong-wi had insisted on hiring a woman.
He knew perfectly well what was going through his daughter’s head.
For Yeo Jong-wi, any grand romance between his daughter and some man was nothing but a nuisance.
And yet, even so, the thought that an escort with only an iron token would be arriving had been unbearable.
Which was why he had gone all the way to the Murim Alliance and made a scene.
And then he had seen the infuriatingly composed face of the Hall Lord of the Guest Hall, and suspicion had bloomed in his mind.
What on earth was going on? Had the man lost his mind?
He was someone who had built the greatest merchant house in the Central Plains entirely through his own business acumen.
If one judged by intuition alone, he was probably among the most formidable people in all the world.
And yet even Yeo Jong-wi had never imagined that the woman called Thorny Immortal Mae Yeong-ok would come along with nothing more than an iron token.
Not to mention the young lady of the North Sea Ice Palace and the granddaughter of the Dang family head.
If he had anticipated that, then he would have been beyond human.
Yeo Jong-wi welcomed Harin’s group with a broad, cheerful smile.
The Thorny Immortal, of all people. Someone you couldn’t summon even if you offered her a fortune in gold.
Even if you could summon her, she was the sort of person who had to be received as the most honored of honored guests.
Since such a woman had come, there was no way he could treat her carelessly.
But to his surprise, the Thorny Immortal merely shook her head and said in a placid voice, “There’s no need for that. I merely came here with this child, so I shall stand quietly and then leave.”
No one knew the rumors about the Thorny Immortal better than Yeo Jong-wi did.
It wasn’t for nothing that the character for thorn, geok, was in her epithet.
She was a woman sharp and prickly to the core.
Even the fact that she was speaking so calmly left Yeo Jong-wi startled.
And there were even more things waiting to surprise him.
The Thorny Immortal? Astonishing, of course. Naturally astonishing.
But the woman who had brought such a person with her, this Baek Harin, was even more astonishing.
A woman with only an iron token. In other words, someone of no consequence whatsoever.
And yet that woman arrived, and the Thorny Immortal followed her?
On top of that, her looks were even more shocking.
She resembled the young lady of the North Sea Ice Palace, Baek Jin-ah, almost exactly.
So Yeo Jong-wi could only let his imagination run wild.
He was the sort of man who, precisely because he was so perceptive, could invent all manner of possibilities no one else would even consider.
There’s something going on here!
And then Yeo I-ryeong, seeing those four women, went wide-eyed.
She had long since erased the image of some handsome young martial talent from her mind.
Honestly, that sort of thing wasn’t important right now. There was no way she could look at the women in front of her and think of anything else.
“Oh my goodness! Oh my goodness! How could this be!”
Then, in a flurry of excitement, she hurried over to the Thorny Immortal, clasped her hands together, and said, “You really are! You really are Mae Yeong-ok, aren’t you!? The Jongnam First Sword!? The Number One Sword Among Women!? The Cold-Rice Divine Maiden!?”
Under ordinary circumstances, the Thorny Immortal would have loathed such familiar behavior and driven the person away.
But not now.
She had come here with Harin, and Harin was on duty.
Which meant she couldn’t afford to act rashly.
Ever since she had reached her level and earned her reputation, the Thorny Immortal had never once tolerated this kind of approach.
So even if she couldn’t show it outwardly, she was inwardly quite flustered.
More precisely, she had no idea how she was supposed to shake this off.
Fortunately, Yeo I-ryeong hadn’t been expecting any particular reaction from the Thorny Immortal anyway.
And she had another person besides the Thorny Immortal who could capture her attention.
“My goodness! Just look at that hair! And those eyes! Are you really the young lady of the Ice Palace!? What’s the relationship between the two of you? Your surnames are the same, and even your faces are so alike... And you’re both so beautiful! I’m curious. Can’t you tell me? Huh? Why exactly are you here as my escort!? What’s going on!?”
Harin, smiling a little awkwardly because she didn’t know what to say, and Baek Jin-ah, who wore the same expression.
Regardless of their reactions, Yeo I-ryeong kept chattering away.
“Oh! You’re really from the Dang family? I’ve heard of Lady Dang! I heard she was a once-in-a-century talent from the Dang family! Is that true!? Then you must really be skilled in poison arts and hidden weapons!? You don’t look like it! Are all those poisons and hidden blades stored in those sleeves of yours!? Can you show me once!? Please!?”
Watching Yeo I-ryeong, all four women had the very same thought.
Tiring...
The problem was that they couldn’t push her away. Once they had taken the job, they couldn’t simply refuse now.
So the four women all had the same feeling: the five days ahead of them were going to be very, very long.
Yeo I-ryeong, meanwhile, was still busy babbling without pause.
* * *
“Phew.”
I let out a sigh as quietly as I could, in case someone heard me, and then tightened my guard once more as I continued escorting Yeo I-ryeong.
It was the first day of the escort, and the first meeting had left a fairly strong impression.
Honestly, the job was harder than I’d expected. It wasn’t enough to just stand around blankly at her side.
I’d never really thought much about etiquette or manners before.
But during this escort, I learned something new about them.
Etiquette, manners, decorum.
I’d always thought those things were just the sort of refinement that made people look more cultured and elegant.
But that wasn’t their essence at all.
Ye—propriety—was a basic gesture that showed the other person you had no intention of harming them.
Laying down your weapon and bowing. Showing your empty hands and offering the formal clasped-hands salute. Lowering your head to greet someone even while turning your gaze away.
It was the same with the modern handshake. You show your hand is empty, and you shorten the distance between yourself and the other person.
In other words, etiquette was exactly that.
An expression of nonviolence: Let’s talk comfortably without fighting.
That was why Yeo I-ryeong’s birthday mattered too.
Yeo Jong-wi, the head of the Mangeum Merchant Guild, apparently had many enemies.
Which meant that among all the people who had come to celebrate, there might also be someone with a grudge.
People couldn’t see into one another’s hearts. They couldn’t read minds.
So all you could do was judge from the outside and guess what sort of intentions someone had.
That was what etiquette was for.
There were an astonishing number of people who had come to congratulate Yeo Jong-wi and Yeo I-ryeong.
It was the greatest merchant association in the Central Plains, after all. They couldn’t afford to miss a chance like this.
It probably wasn’t just Yeo I-ryeong’s birthday, either. They would likely come with worn-out soles to every event that family held.
Anyway, my biggest job was to watch carefully whenever such people approached and make sure nothing they did violated proper etiquette.
The logic was simple. A breach of etiquette meant there was room for some other kind of mischief.
I finally understood why, in historical dramas, they made things so complicated whenever someone approached a king or emperor.
And this era was even more so.
It was a world where cold weapons and firearms both existed, and where the invisible threat of martial arts hung over everything.
The good news was that the Thorny Immortal was here.
To put it simply, the Thorny Immortal was a nuclear weapon.
She was a deterrent that could force peace.
Anyone who had come here with other intentions would probably give up the moment they saw her.
I would too. Damn it, we’re done for! We’re so done for! Running away without looking back would be the natural response.
But that didn’t mean I could slack off on the escort.
An escort was like that. You could do it right ninety-nine times, and one mistake still meant failure.
Besides, this was only the first day. Four more remained.
So I ignored everything else and focused only on the escort.
I watched the people drawing near, searching their faces for any sign of trouble or anything that could be misunderstood.
And so the first day passed.
Fortunately, nothing happened on the first day.
No misunderstandings. No small incidents.
Well, that was a relief. Nothing happening was a good thing.
And besides, the escort only mattered when Yeo I-ryeong appeared before others.
Once the day’s event ended and she went into her quarters, I didn’t need to escort her any further.
Still, this was really exhausting. Spending all day with my nerves wound tight was no way to live.
* * *
The suspicious group that had been watching Yeo I-ryeong with resentful eyes had spent the whole day lurking and watching, only to accomplish nothing and waste the entire day.
But I couldn’t really blame them.
It was the Thorny Immortal. The Thorny Immortal.
That monster of a woman would cut down a human being without the slightest hesitation, expression unchanged.
They knew full well that no matter what they tried, within that woman’s reach they couldn’t do a damn thing.
So giving up was the right choice. Whatever revenge they might have wanted, it was obvious they’d only die a pointless death.
And then a man appeared before them.
“W-What!?”
“The fact that you’re hiding here like rats means you’ve got some scheme of your own.”
The men trembled as they looked at the masked stranger who had suddenly appeared.
Had they been discovered!? How did he know!? Questions swirled in their heads.
“Be grateful. I’ll lend you a little help. If you follow my instructions, even lowly nobodies like you may yet find an opening.”
“W-What instructions are you talking about!?”
One of the men forced himself to sound brave as he asked, and Jeokwol smiled thinly beneath his mask.