Flesh and Blood
The Luoyang Sword Family.
The residence of the Third and Fourth Young Mistresses.
"They destroyed the Yi Family…?"
The clothes slipped from Third Young Mistress Yeon Da-eun's hands.
"…Elder Brother did?"
She had been buzzing with excitement at the thought of going to meet her eldest brother, cheerfully picking out something to wear for the outing.
"He didn't wipe them out to the last man, of course."
The head steward of the residence spoke in an even tone.
"But the Yi Family no longer exists in Luoyang."
"……"
The Third Young Mistress's face hardened.
"Unnie! According to the report that just came in…!"
The door burst open and Fourth Young Mistress Yeon Da-hye strode in.
In her hand was a summary report from the Luoyang Sword Family's intelligence bureau.
"…Looking at your face, you've already heard."
The Third Young Mistress slowly nodded.
"…In broad strokes, yes."
She took the summary report from her sister and began to read.
It was only a single sheet, yet the further her eyes moved down the page, the slower her gaze became.
"…Head of the Yi Family: missing. Possibility of elimination by the First Young Master cannot be ruled out."
Third Young Mistress Yeon Da-eun bit her lip.
"The disappearances of the Yi Family's currently serving officials were orchestrated by the Gong Family. They are openly abducting and detaining the officials."
For a scrap of paper, the report carried an almost unbearable weight.
"Should the Gong Family's aim be the spread of shock and terror, the tortured corpses of those officials are expected to turn up throughout Luoyang in due course."
She read the final line of the summary.
"This conflict is predicted to intensify further…"
Fourth Young Mistress Yeon Da-hye stepped quietly closer and laid a hand on her twin sister's shoulder.
"Unnie…."
A house of this scale was, in equal measure, a place where the black hungers of countless people tangled and clashed without restraint.
That darkness ran so deep it would not even easily permit a simple reunion between brother and sisters.
Of all times for the head of the Business Support Department to be away…
The head steward—who had once served their late mother and now served them—swallowed a quiet sigh and spoke.
"…Young Mistresses. That is precisely why I so strongly urged you not to go through with this meeting."
He did not look away from the two girls who were as dear to him as his own children.
"What you are about to step into is a battlefield of a scale neither of you has ever faced."
He held his feelings in check and did not spare the advice.
"Since Grand Madam Ha passed, the Ha clan's influence within the Sword Family has dwindled to almost nothing. Even so, beginning with this old man, a great many inside and outside this residence still serve the two of you as their masters."
At those words, the Third and Fourth Young Mistresses clenched their teeth.
Even when the support division of the Business Support Department to which they currently belonged had lined up behind the Second Young Master, they had thought of it as nothing more than an extension of the same factional struggles they had always watched within the family.
But today—in barely half a day—a powerful Luoyang house that had been building its strength since the previous dynasty had been erased.
And this, they were told, was only the beginning.
"I know full well that the two of you hope for the warmth of blood between yourselves and the First Young Master. But there is every chance the Second Young Master's faction will 'misunderstand' a meeting with him."
The old steward finished everything he felt obliged to say, for their sake.
"You must also not forget that you bear responsibility for every soul who follows you."
His words ended, yet neither the Third nor the Fourth Young Mistress opened her mouth.
A heavy atmosphere pressed down on them, utterly at odds with the bright, tastefully appointed room that had been decorated to suit a young girl's preferences.
"…Steward. Give us a moment alone."
"Of course."
He stepped out into the corridor and closed the door.
In the empty hall, the head steward quietly lowered his eyes and held his post with the same unwavering formality as always.
After a stretch of time that seemed to drag on forever, the door opened.
"Unnie."
Fourth Young Mistress Yeon Da-hye clasped her twin sister's hand tightly and nodded to her.
"Steward."
"Yes, Young Mistress."
Third Young Mistress Yeon Da-eun continued, addressing him.
"Your counsel was of great help."
"We have reached a decision," the Fourth Young Mistress took up.
"We will meet our eldest brother."
"But not merely to feel the affection of blood."
"We are going to meet First Young Master Yeon So-hyeon."
The steward's eyes widened.
"By that you mean…?"
They laid out the reasoning behind the choice they had so carefully weighed.
"We are not satisfied with what this family has become. This house is clearly headed in the wrong direction."
The title of the greatest house under heaven did nothing more than display the Luoyang Sword Family's wealth and power.
Twisted and rotten through, the family only grew worse with every passing day.
"If the Second or Third Young Master becomes Young Family Head, this house will become something even more monstrous than it is now."
"I have a feeling that either of those two would shove the entire family into civil war without the slightest hesitation to get there."
"And that might well bring the whole house to ruin."
"Until now, we have always found one excuse or another and taken one step back, and then another."
They both nodded at once, their resolve firm.
"We will no longer sit still and wait for this family to change on its own."
"From now on, we will move to change it ourselves."
The power and influence they held within the Luoyang Sword Family were slight—but their will was not.
"And for that, we will meet our eldest brother—First Young Master Yeon So-hyeon."
"We will meet First Young Master Yeon So-hyeon and confirm his will and his aims."
"And if he desires the same Sword Family we desire—"
"Then we will take his hand and add our strength to his."
The head steward looked upon the twin sisters as if gazing at something radiant.
The fourteen-year-old children who, only moments before, had seemed like nothing more than girls, were no longer there.
"Even after all those long years, Elder Brother has risen on his own and is fighting back."
The fact that Yeon So-hyeon had broken his seclusion and moved so forcefully as to collide with the Second Young Master had, in the end, reached even them.
"Now we move as well."
"This is our will."
As if shedding an old skin to become butterflies, the two of them were, in that instant, reborn.
The head steward dropped to one knee before them.
"I receive my masters' command."
With respect and reverence.
The title by which he had always addressed the Third and Fourth Young Mistresses shifted from "Young Mistress" to "Master."
They now understood their duty, knew its weight, had chosen the path ahead, and carried the will to point the way.
The qualities of a sovereign that had long slept within them were beginning to awaken.
"If my masters desire something, then to cast my life away like a worn shoe to see it done is the duty of those who serve."
The twin masters smiled at him.
"Well then—pick us out something to wear that will not disgrace the Ha family."
He laughed heartily.
"Of course."
As he sorted through various outdoor garments, he spoke to them in a suggestive tone.
"…This old servant has heard a certain piece of news concerning the First Young Master."
"News of Elder Brother?"
"What is it? What is it?"
Utterly loyal—and every bit as capable—the head steward maintained his own intelligence network within the Luoyang Sword Family.
It was by that network's power that he had already grasped the outline of the situation around the time the Fourth Young Mistress received the summary report from the intelligence bureau.
"I cannot speak to how reliable the information is, but according to what I have heard—"
He smiled as he spoke.
"The First Young Master you have so longed to meet may soon be paying a visit to the Sword Family itself."
The Luoyang Sword Family's special-grade closed training grounds.
The escort captain who had been charged with the First Young Master's protection the night before was reporting to his direct superior, the Guard Pavilion Master.
Having heard the full report, the Guard Pavilion Master asked him again.
"You are certain of what you saw?"
Her eyelids trembled faintly.
"Yes. I checked and rechecked several times. There is no doubt."
He answered with conviction.
"The True Steps the First Young Master displayed last night were, without question, the Grand Elder's True Steps."
He was the very same escort captain who had stood entranced, staring at the traces of those steps Yeon So-hyeon had left behind in the temporary command tent of the Valley of Sin the night before.
"…Yeon So-hyeon. That child not only concealed his martial arts all this time—"
The Guard Pavilion Master—Yeon So-hyeon's aunt and the Grand Elder's elder sister—lifted a hand to hide her stunned expression.
"He has mastered that monster's exclusive arts…?"
Calling her own younger brother, the Grand Elder, a monster, her words were heavy with awe toward the incomprehensible, and that awe carved a vast distance between them.
"Hahahahat!"
The one who burst into bold, ringing laughter beside them was none other than the Second Young Mistress—Heavenly Robe Without Seams, Yeon Seo-rin.
"Just like that brat. So he went and mastered Father's sword—something no one else has even dared attempt!"
Her master and aunt, the Guard Pavilion Master, turned at those words.
"You knew that child possessed the talent to handle internal qi?!"
Even under her master's rebuke, Yeon Seo-rin only shrugged, unconcerned.
"You didn't know, Master? I thought everyone did."
At her shameless reply, her master's gaze sharpened.
"What did you say?!"
Yeon Seo-rin scratched her head.
"Talent for internal qi? Martial aptitude? Isn't that the kind of thing everyone can tell just by 'taking a quick look'?"
What kind of world did this once-in-a-generation genius, called Heavenly Robe Without Seams, truly see?
The Guard Pavilion Master and the escort captain both found themselves, for a moment, at a loss for words.
"……"
Yeon Seo-rin, who had always lived as if she knew nothing but martial arts, once again breezed past without sharing what she had known all along.
"…Yeon Seo-rin."
There was no way she could fail to read the emotion in her master's eyes.
"Whoa! So So-hyeon mastered Father's sword—looks like I won't have time to sit around either!"
In her heart, she was thinking something else entirely.
So-hyeon. Spread your wings wide. Then even those fools who cannot understand anything of a different order will have no choice but to see the wings that cover heaven and earth.
Yeon Seo-rin rolled her shoulders and headed back toward the training yard.
"……"
Looking up at the distant sky and recalling her younger brother, the Grand Elder, the Guard Pavilion Master's face trembled faintly.
So the eldest son that monster left behind has finally…
Was it envy in that expression, or hatred, or resentment, or pain?
Does he mean to stand in my way as his father did…!
She shifted her gaze to Yeon Seo-rin's retreating back.
This time, I will win! My disciple will be the greatest in the Sword Family—and in this Central Plains!
The Valley of Sin.
The joint business headquarters of the First and Fourth Young Masters.
Fourth Young Master Yeon Bi's office.
"The Yi Family has been wiped out?"
There stood a boy erupting in laughter so wild it bordered on the grotesque.
The old woman leaning on a cane—Gwak Nopin, the Fourth Young Master's closest confidante—corrected him with a sour look.
"Not wiped out to the last of their bloodline, exactly—more that the family itself has ceased to exist…"
Fourth Young Master Yeon Bi paid such distinctions no mind at all.
"Idiots! Morons!"
It did not even seem to reach his ears.
"This Luoyang is crawling with fools! Fools who bare their teeth without even recognizing the true master of this city and of our main house—Elder Brother!"
He held high the Hyeonwol Pavilion report detailing the Yi Family's ruin and cried out.
It was a proud record of victory, steeped in blood and death.
"This is our war, and this is the power of the sovereign we follow!"
Save for those already out on assignment, the confidants gathered there all bowed their heads.
"The Cheong Family and the Gong Family are charging forward like this—we cannot afford to fall behind!"
He slammed his desk.
"Tell every last one of them to throw themselves into their assigned duties as if they mean to bury their bones there!"
Barely thirteen years old.
From the slight frame of that small boy poured a force of presence and killing intent so fierce it was almost impossible to believe.
"We will not be pushed aside by people who just rolled in out of nowhere!"
The boy's great voice rang through the office.
"Those who stand closest to Elder Brother must be us—those who carry the blood of Sichuan!"
To their lord's rallying cry, his confidants answered as one.
"Loyalty!"