Chapter 105: Enlightenment
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 105: Enlightenment
Having been reborn as a true gumiho, she assessed her new state.
Not only had she regained her strength, but she now also possessed the power of the Celestial Fox and the Dark Fox. She was stronger than she had ever been in the past. This was a new golden age.
All that remained was to achieve the wish she had failed to grasp back then. She felt a certainty that now, she could overcome any trial.
But before that…
“Darling? Why in the world did you come all this way? I’m sure I told you not to come.”
The gumiho was curious about Karami’s actions.
Why had he come here?
It was a question that remained unanswered no matter how much she pondered it. She felt she could only sort out her tumultuous feelings and thoughts after hearing his answer.
“Is there any reason I shouldn’t come just because you told me not to?”
“Hm?”
“I am the master, and you are the slave. Where in the world is there a master who follows a slave’s orders?”
It was a perfectly fundamental argument.
The master gives the orders.
The slave follows them.
There was no need for a master to obey a slave’s words.
“Well, you have a point.”
The gumiho let out a hollow laugh at the simple, clear logic and nodded in agreement. She gazed at the sky with a wistful look and murmured.
“A slave and a master… is that what we are…”
A bond so strong that not even death could sever it.
Why had her past self never had someone like that?
No, perhaps she had.
The gumiho turned her gaze to Heukbi.
“Dark Fox, why did you betray me?”
To the gumiho, the Dark Fox had been a comrade-in-arms, a friend, and a younger sister.
Their trust had been so deep that she would have readily offered her back on the battlefield. It was because of her betrayal that the gumiho had been so helplessly defeated.
The Dark Fox tilted her head, looking both brazen and genuinely confused.
“Betrayal? It was not I who betrayed you, Lady Gumiho, but you who betrayed us.”
“…What?”
“Unable to contain your greed, you endangered our people, and you never once listened to my counsel. And what was the result?”
The gumiho’s desire to stand in the heavens.
To achieve that single ambition, countless members of the Fox Clan had been unable to live out their natural lives. The fox clan, which had once held sway over the world, was brought to the brink of extinction.
The surviving members of the Fox Clan scattered across the world, and even then, the heavens, wary of their power, sent down Divine Punishment, reducing them to mere yokai.
“You betrayed the trust of the foxes who followed you.”
“That’s…”
As the gumiho struggled for a rebuttal, Heukbi pleaded with her sorrowfully.
“Just once. If you had only listened to my words just once… we would never have come to this…”
She had never once looked back.
She had abandoned her dying kin.
Heukbi’s choice that day had been the best possible decision to save her clan.
“Was it so difficult to be content with reality? So difficult that you had to drive your own clan into hell?”
“I just wanted to let everyone do as they pleased…”
“And yet, in the end, no one was left.”
Each of Heukbi’s words struck her like a cold dagger.
If it had been anyone else, the gumiho would have scoffed and dismissed them, but the one speaking was Heukbi.
Heukbi had never been one to show her emotions. To see such a person appeal to her, overwhelmed with feeling—even the great gumiho could not ignore it.
Completely subdued by mere words.
The gumiho’s head drooped.
“Now, now, let’s not fight over things that are long past. After being betrayed and sealed for hundreds of years, wouldn’t you say Big Rin has paid for her sins?”
Hundreds of years was long enough for the statute of limitations to run out several dozen times over.
“This is not a matter for an outsider to meddle in.”
“That might have been true in the past, but not anymore. Big Rin is my slave. I’m no outsider.”
“Big Rin…?”
“It’s the gumiho’s name. The other gumiho inside is Rin. This one is Big Rin.”
Rin had grown so much that it was hard to call her ‘little’ anymore, but he couldn’t think of another way to distinguish them, so he just called them what came to mind.
Heukbi was deeply shocked.
He gave the gumiho a name?
She stared at the gumiho with astonished eyes, but ironically, the gumiho didn’t deny it. She merely twirled a strand of her hair with a finger, avoiding Heukbi’s gaze.
“I-It might not be… so bad… It sounds kind of nice once you get used to it…”
A second shock.
Just moments ago, this woman had been going on about how being called by a name was a form of subjugation, a binding curse, yet now she was saying she didn’t mind being named by a human.
“Lady Gumiho… have you turned into a female?”
“A female! What is this girl saying?”
Her reaction was like that of a fresh, innocent maiden.
As a gumiho, she was optimized for seducing men, but the reverse was an unfamiliar experience. With a hero appearing at a moment of crisis, her female DNA couldn’t help but activate.
Her blushing face was as good as a declaration of her new status.
“This can’t be…”
Heukbi’s current state of mind was this: the idol she had respected and admired had been swept off her feet by some unknown man and was now announcing her retirement. She would no longer be the sparkling idol for everyone.
“Lady Gumiho, you would be better off taking your own life.”
That would be preferable.
It was better to die with her pride as an empress than to live as a mere female. It was far better than seeing her idol sullied. It was the kind of reaction that comes when a fangirl’s obsession reaches its peak.
“Like hell I’m going to die!”
The gumiho burst out laughing, utterly dumbfounded.
She took a deep breath, then looked at Heukbi and spoke softly.
“I’m sorry.”
“……!”
“You were right. I wish I had looked to my side, just once. It’s far too late for regrets, but still.”
There was nothing more foolish than regretting the past.
“Haaaah~”
The gumiho stretched languidly.
Her expression was one of relief.
“Are you leaving?”
“I plan to. I shouldn’t take up any more time. I need to return this body to its master.”
She had figured out what had been nagging at her, and she had learned the hidden story of her past. Apologizing with a single word felt insufficient for what she’d done to the Dark Fox, but it would have to do.
“Aren’t you going to stand in the heavens?”
“This power is not something I achieved on my own. Just skimming the cream off the top isn’t my style. The right to stand in the heavens belongs to you all, not me.”
A light began to shimmer from the gumiho’s body.
Enlightenment.
With no particular lingering attachments, she was preparing to depart.
‘If I had to name one…’
Just one thing.
She wasn’t sure if it was a regret, but there was one last thing she was curious about.
“What would it have been like if I’d had you in my past?”
Like the Rin of today.
What if she’d had a master to lead her not from the side or from behind, but from the front? Would things have been drastically different?
To the gumiho, who asked out of a lingering attachment, Karami smiled simply.
“If we had met in the past, I probably would have died. Would you have even paid me any mind?”
“Hmm…”
“Projecting your enlightened present self onto your past self is a cruel thing to do to who you were back then.”
In other words, no matter how charming Karami tried to be in front of the old gumiho, she would have treated him like a passing bug and squashed him without a thought. The only reason they could speak so comfortably was because they had met now.
“You’re right about that.”
It was pointless to discuss hypotheticals that could never be.
The past could not be twisted, not even by fate.
“You know, since this is the last time… could you pat my head, just once?”
Every time Karami petted Rin’s head, a flood of Rin’s happy emotions would pour into her. She was curious what it felt like to evoke such a feeling.
“That’s not difficult.”
Thump. Karami placed his hand on her head.
He gently moved his hand, stroking her hair.
The sensation was unfamiliar, yet comforting.
The corners of the gumiho’s lips drew a faint crescent moon.
“Aha, so this is what it feels like… Not bad.”
He continued to stroke her hair for a while before finally removing his hand.
The gumiho was fully satisfied.
“I’ll be going now.”
Light filled the gumiho’s body, and her spirit form slipped out. Karami caught Rin’s slumping body.
—I almost forgot to tell you. It’s thanks to Rin that you’re alive. She kept your life essence perfectly preserved. And I was the one who tempted her to eat it, so don’t hate her too much.
“I know.”
—Good, as long as you know.
The two of them would be the best ones to resolve their own issues.
She didn’t need to worry about it anymore.
The gumiho exchanged a final glance with Heukbi and raised the corners of her lips slightly.
—Looks like I’m just apologizing and running away.
“……”
—Heukbi, was it? That’s a pretty name.
A calm farewell.
With no regrets left, the gumiho’s spirit form scattered and vanished.
Heukbi stared at the empty space where she had been for a long time.
“Mmm…”
Rin let out a soft moan in Karami’s arms, as if talking in her sleep.
With the gumiho gone, Rin’s consciousness naturally surfaced. Since she had been watching the entire situation from within, it wasn’t difficult for her to come to her senses.
Rin averted her gaze, her eyes darting to the side as she gave an awkward greeting.
“Ah, hello, Master.”
“It’s been a while.”
Rin’s lips trembled.
She had already thought about what she needed to say while she was inside.
“…I’m sorry. Rin put you in danger…”
“It’s alright. I survived because of it, didn’t I?”
He hadn’t died from consuming the life essence, but he had survived because he had consumed it.
One had to consider the gumiho’s temptation, and even though Rin’s body had matured as her tails grew, she was still mentally immature. She was just a child in a grown-up’s body.
Just as a parent takes responsibility for and disciplines their child’s mistakes, a master simply had to take responsibility for his slave’s. He just needed to teach her not to do it again.
As Karami slowly raised his hand, Rin’s ears immediately reacted, parting to either side. To make it easier for him to pet her. Even after all this time, her body remembered.
Karami smiled wryly and stroked her head once more.
Rin closed her eyes, savoring the touch of his hand. At some point, her nine tails had wrapped around Karami, holding him in a tight embrace.
“I apologize for interrupting this emotional reunion, but I do not believe we have the leisure to be enjoying it.”
Heukbi straightened her neck and looked up at the sky.
Darkness was blanketing the heavens.
An ominous energy was converging on a single point.
It was in the direction of Vestia.
“What is that?”
“It is Divine Punishment.”
Some called it Divine Punishment, but it was closer to a Heavenly Calamity.
It was a disaster brought about by the gumiho.
Its purpose was to restore the twisted Mandates of Heaven.
Simply put, it was an attempt to clean up everyone entangled with the gumiho, along with the gumiho herself.
It was similar to Ragnarok.
“We need to go back right now.”
“Farewell.”
Seeing Heukbi bow demurely, Karami tilted his head.
“What are you talking about? Lady Dark Fox, you’re coming with us.”
“And why must I accompany you?”
“You’ve lost all your power. What are you going to do here alone? Besides, as a member of the Fox Clan, you should witness the end.”
This was definitely not about collecting the set of three yokai foxes.
Definitely not.