The Second Yao Flower
The silence that fell over the prison courtyard was almost unnatural.
Even the wind seemed to hold its breath. Jeong So-yun, who had turned her head, found her gaze locked in one spot as if bewitched.
In the middle of a pack of bandits growling with their blades raised, a woman stood motionless, resembling a pure white lotus. Her eyes were redder than fresh blood.
Wherever her cold gaze landed, the air froze solid. As those chilling crimson eyes swept across the crowd, more than a hundred bandits stiffened like prey before a massive predator. The overwhelming aura radiating from her entire being had crushed their momentum completely.
Not a single person dared take a step under her quiet stare.
Only the ragged, terrified breathing and the trembling rattle of sword hilts filled the silence.
Just who… is that woman?
A shiver ran down Jeong So-yun’s spine.
Her face was still youthful and strikingly beautiful, barely past her early twenties. Yet her martial prowess was impossible to measure. She had fought on equal or greater footing with the black-robed monster who had subdued her in a single strike, and now, without even lifting a finger, she had frozen several hundred men in place with nothing but sheer dominance.
Thanks to her, Jeong So-yun had escaped that hellish prison. Energy was beginning to circulate once more through her dried-up dantian.
If not for her, she would have rotted away, chained in cold iron.
“Ugh…”
She barely managed to swallow the breath that had risen to her throat. Her blurry vision slowly regained focus. As her senses returned, a sudden memory from inside the prison slammed into her mind.
The pale hand that had reached out to her, saying she had come to save her.
And then, without warning, the hot, wet sensation of lips pressing against hers.
The memory of that soft tongue forcing its way between her tightly clenched teeth, ravaging her mouth and tangling with her own, was painfully vivid. The obscene sound of mixing saliva and the strange thrill that had raced through her veins like it would melt her entire body—she remembered it all too clearly.
“Ah…”
Jeong So-yun unconsciously touched her lips.
A burning heat spread across her cheeks and lightly colored the nape of her neck.
Her first kiss. And it had been with a woman, not a man. In this bewildering situation she had never experienced before, she had resisted outwardly, but inside, far from feeling disgust, her heart had pounded wildly at the strange pleasure that had flowed in through their joined lips.
Seol-hye… That was her name, right?
She carefully rolled the name around in her mouth. Just thinking it made her lower abdomen tingle and a strange heat rise within her. Even as she marveled at what a remarkable woman she was, Jeong So-yun’s mind was completely filled with the lingering image of those red, sensual lips.
“What are you standing there spacing out for?!”
A rough voice shattered her hazy thoughts.
—BOOM!
The sound of a massive iron weight slamming into the ground. Seung-pyo, gripping a gigantic double-bladed axe, glared at her with murderous eyes.
“Weren’t you the one who boasted about a fight to the death? Did you piss yourself in fear already?”
Seung-pyo twisted his lips into a sneer. The moment she saw that disgusting face, the fluffy fog that had been floating in Jeong So-yun’s mind vanished instantly, replaced by cold, murderous intent.
“Bullshit.”
Jeong So-yun let out a dry laugh and straightened her staggering body.
“As if I’d be scared of trash like you.”
“Hah! That useless bravado—you really are your father’s daughter.”
Seung-pyo clicked his tongue in mockery.
“Your father, Jeong Gwan-pyeong, acted like a rat most of the time, but then showed strange courage in places where it wasn’t needed at all.”
“Don’t you dare speak my father’s name with that filthy mouth…!”
Jeong So-yun’s eyebrows twitched, but Seung-pyo didn’t stop.
“He didn’t know his place, went against the tide, and acted all high and mighty. That’s why he couldn’t live out his natural lifespan. What an idiot.”
“You son of a bitch…!”
Even at her murderous curse, Seung-pyo clutched his belly and cackled with glee.
“Kekeke, that’s right. Shall I give you a fun story as traveling money for the road to the afterlife? Your father didn’t die of illness.”
“What…?”
He put on a mock-sad expression and pointed the axe he was holding toward her as he continued.
“I’m the one who killed him. Every night, I added just a tiny bit of colorless, odorless poison to the strong liquor he loved so much. He drank it all down without ever realizing his insides were slowly melting away.”
“……!!!”
At those words, Jeong So-yun’s eyes shook violently as if struck by an earthquake.
“Hmph. You should thank me. If that stubborn bastard Jeong Gwan-pyeong had kept clinging to the position of chief, the Green Forest Tablet we finally obtained would have been taken away, and Heukpungchae would have been left behind and destroyed!”
—Crack.
A horrifying sound of breaking came from Jeong So-yun’s fist.
Her nails dug into her palm, and drops of red blood splattered onto the dirt floor.
“I’m going to kill you!!!”
—BOOOOM!!!
The mere force of her kicking off the ground made the surrounding air tremble. Her body shot forward through the cloud of dust like a starving beast, charging straight for Seung-pyo’s throat.
A strike filled with rage that could literally turn stone to powder. But Seung-pyo simply snorted and raised his massive axe handle to block in front of him.
—KWAANG—!
Jeong So-yun’s fist slammed directly into the side of the axe blade, producing a deafening roar. The recoil that felt like it would shatter her hand bones traveled all the way up to her shoulder, but Seung-pyo’s massive frame didn’t budge an inch, like an ancient tree.
“Keke, look at this exhausted bitch struggling. You think that ragged body of yours can beat me?!”
—WHOOSH!
Seung-pyo’s eyes flashed. The heavy axe he held swept horizontally with ferocious momentum.
“Ugh!”
Jeong So-yun swallowed a scream at the instinctive sense of danger and threw herself backward. She barely avoided a direct hit, but the storm-like shockwave sent her flying like a sheet of paper before she crashed into the ground.
Damn it, my body…!
Even though the energy Seol-hye had given her had rekindled a small spark in her nearly empty dantian, her body—torn apart by long torture—had already reached its limit after just a few movements and was screaming in protest.
“I’ll crush you!”
Seung-pyo didn’t miss the opening. Like a predator driving its prey into a corner, he poured down a relentless barrage of axe strikes without giving her a chance to breathe.
—BANG! KWAANG!!
Every time the heavy axe blade grazed by, the once-solid ground was gouged deeply, and sharp fragments of stone shot up like daggers.
“Ugh, ngh!”
She rolled across the dusty crater, using the Naryeotagon footwork. There was no longer any grace or precision in Jeong So-yun’s movements.
Her skin scraped against the ground, and flying debris tore at her cheeks and forearms. Even as red blood seeped through her torn clothes, she had no time to feel the pain. If she stopped, she would die. That single thought was the only thing driving her forward.
Damn it, at this rate—!
The cold reality pierced her to the bone. Facing that kind of power head-on with a broken body was suicide. There was only one way. She had to create an opening. Even if it cost her life, she needed one decisive chance.
“Kuhahaha! It’s over now, niece! I’ll send you to your father in hell!”
Seung-pyo was already certain of victory. The ferocious aura pouring from his entire body condensed entirely into his axe blade. The onslaught continued with such force that even a single direct hit would turn her into a lump of meat.
“Jikha Myeolsae—Straight Down Destruction!”
The axe, raised high above his head, fell with the majesty to split a mountain.
Along with Seung-pyo’s roar-like shout, the axe plummeted toward Jeong So-yun. There was nowhere to run. The pressure crushing her from all directions pinned her feet in place.
In that moment of absolute crisis.
Jeong So-yun’s eyes, which had been filled with the fear of death, suddenly flashed with a strange light.
Now!
Instead of retreating, she kicked off the ground and lunged forward, throwing herself straight into the trajectory of the falling axe blade—into the jaws of blue death. It was a reckless act like a moth flying into a flame, but Jeong So-yun knew it was her only path to survival.
—Slice!KWAAANG!
A horrifying tearing sound struck her eardrums. The axe blade grazed her forehead as it passed, shattering the ground behind her by a hair’s breadth. Hot blood burst from her forehead and flowed down her face, but her body, having crossed the boundary between life and death, did not stop. It simply charged forward.
“What?!”
Seung-pyo’s eyes bulged in shock. Before he could even register the prey that had burrowed into his embrace, Jeong So-yun’s right leg snapped up like a lie.
Amplifying the recoil from kicking the ground with a twist of her waist, a lightning-fast kick.
—CRACK.
After the dull impact came a spine-chilling tearing sound. The moment Jeong So-yun’s instep accurately crushed the wrist that had been gripping the axe handle, Seung-pyo’s grip loosened from unbearable pain, and the heavy axe flew away helplessly.
“Kuaaaaagh!”
With the heavy threat gone, Seung-pyo’s now-empty chest was exposed defenselessly right before her eyes.
A perfect opportunity. Jeong So-yun clenched her teeth so hard they nearly shattered and scraped together every last drop of internal energy left in the deepest part of her dantian. The scorching power she had drawn out to the final drop concentrated fiercely at the end of her right fist along with her shoulder.
The moment her right foot stomped the ground, the heavy shockwave of the jin-gak shook the earth.
The explosive recoil from the ground traveled up her leg to her waist, then instantly to her shoulder. That tremendous elasticity drove her shoulder forward like a battering ram smashing through a castle gate, slamming into Seung-pyo’s chest.
“Guh—!”
The instant Seung-pyo’s upper body bent and went numb, Jeong So-yun rode the momentum of her rotation and poured every ounce of her remaining energy into her fist, driving it straight into his solar plexus.
—CRAAAAACK!
“Kuaaaaagh—!!”
A terrible tearing sound echoed across the moonless night sky.
With the sound of his sternum caving in and all his ribs shattering, the massive body floated into the air like a paper doll before crashing into the ground ten jang away.
“K… rgh… ugh…?!”
Within the thick cloud of dust, Seung-pyo convulsed while coughing up blood, but Jeong So-yun did not stop. Still radiating heavy killing intent, she charged toward the fallen Seung-pyo and mounted him.
“K… ah… s-spare… me…!!”
With red foam bubbling at the corner of his mouth, Seung-pyo weakly reached out a trembling hand. His eyes, stained with fear and pain, shook pitifully. But in Jeong So-yun’s cold eyes as she looked down at his pathetic plea, not a single speck of mercy remained.
—Crack.
Instead of answering, Jeong So-yun clenched her blood-and-dirt-covered fist tightly. The light of reason had long since vanished from her eyes.
“My father, who was nothing more than a bandit, must have fallen into hell already.”
A metallic voice mixed with self-mockery and sobs flowed from her throat.
—CRACK!!!
Immediately after, her fist slammed down without hesitation into the center of Seung-pyo’s face, shattering his nose bone.
—THUD! THUD! THUD!
“Now… you… go after him…!”
With every successive punch, teeth broke and cheekbones caved in.
“After you die by my hand… die once more by my father’s hand in hell—!”
Within the burning rage that had swallowed her reason, Jeong So-yun roared like a beast and swung her fists.
Even as the skin on the back of her hands tore open to reveal white bone, even as the hot blood spraying from his face dyed her vision red, her fists did not stop. She continued pounding until Seung-pyo’s face had become an unrecognizable mess of pulp.
How much time had passed?
“Haa… haa… huu…”
Only the ragged breathing that felt like it would tear her lungs apart cut through the silence. On the dirt floor lay Seung-pyo’s corpse, his face gone, reduced to a red mush.
—Slither.
Jeong So-yun staggered to her feet, her blood-and-flesh-covered fists hanging limply at her sides. Her body looked dangerously close to collapse at any moment, yet no one dared to attack her. Under the quiet night sky, the hundreds of bandits stepped back with terrified expressions at the sight of her, looking like an asura drenched in blood.
“Vice-Chief. Seung-pyo… is dead.”
Wiping the sticky blood from her face with the back of her hand, Jeong So-yun spoke in a cracked voice.
“If any of you think that bastard’s way was right, come at me right now.”
Her voice was rough and broken, yet clear and powerful enough to echo throughout the entire mountain stronghold.
“If not, get out of my sight immediately. And never show your faces around Heukpungchae again!”
The moment her heavy command fell, the sound of weapons clattering to the ground rang out one after another.
“H-hiiik!”
“R-run!”
The hundreds of bandits abandoned their weapons and fled down the mountain in a panicked frenzy, not even looking back.
“...”
In the courtyard where the bandits had receded like the tide.
Perhaps because the tension had finally been released, the thread that had been forcibly moving her body past its limit suddenly snapped. Her body swayed violently.
“Ah…”
Strength left her legs and the world tilted. Her vision spun, and the rough, cold ground rushed up to meet her.
—Swish.
But instead of the impact of hitting the ground, a warm and impossibly soft embrace caught her as she fell. Amid the fishy scent of blood that had stung her nose, the faint, clear fragrance of sandalwood washed over her.
“You worked hard, So-yun-ah.”
A gentle voice settled by her ear.
A voice as soft as a spring breeze, yet carrying a deep resonance.
Beyond her fading vision, in the middle of that blood-soaked hellscape, the woman who stood alone like a single pure white lotus—Seol-hye—smiled at her.
Ah…
The emotion that filled Jeong So-yun’s chest was relief.
Or perhaps something even greater.
She no longer tried to hold on. She buried her face deep into that warm embrace and let go of the thread of consciousness, sinking into sweet darkness.