Daybreak
Northern Great General Headquarters.
The inner chambers.
Eldest Young Master Yeon So-hyeon lifted his gaze from the documents. The oil lamp that lit the desk flickered into his sight, its flame blinking on and off.
"……."
He tipped the oil kettle and refilled it, then looked out the window. Beyond the torches that lit the Great General Headquarters, the harsh northern lands stretched away into the dark.
It was a majestic landscape—and one desolate beyond measure.
There was no sleepless city of light like the great metropolis of Luoyang, burning bright without regard for day or night. No far-carrying, honeyed sound of instruments. No laughter of people drowning themselves in pleasure for even a fleeting escape from their cares.
"……."
In their place stood the sentries, eyes wide against the black shadows of an enemy army that might surge up at any moment from the edge of the horizon. There were the blue-steel spearheads they gripped as tightly as their own unease. And there were the rough-woven tents of refugees who had lost every last inch of home, fluttering and reeling in the bitter northern wind as those within tossed sleeplessly through the night.
"……."
That bleak prospect was the whole of his wife, Moyong Un-jeong. Born to the Great General of the Moyong Family, it was everything she meant to protect.
"…Mm."
At the sound of her stirring, Yeon So-hyeon turned. There she was, filling his eyes—fallen asleep just as she sat before his desk.
"Lie down and rest," he had told her.
"I cannot. How could I sleep at ease alone while the Eldest Young Master remains awake?" she had insisted, stubborn to the last.
"……."
She had not even managed to shed all of her armor. She slept sitting in the chair, leaning on the sword she held clamped between her knees. He simply watched her.
As if time itself had stopped. Even the shadows trembling beyond the wavering oil-lamp light held their breath with him in that moment.
"Mm…."
Moyong Un-jeong shifted in her sleep. With a soft rustle, the mountain of documents perched perilously at the edge of her desk began to slide and fall.
"……."
If he raised his inner energy needlessly to stop them, she—so keenly sensitive to presence—would wake. But if he left them, the crash of papers would wake her just the same.
His foot settled light as a feather. The wooden floorboards gave not the slightest sound. His other foot stretched out, and not a single sheet of the cascading documents was permitted to reach the floor. They settled gently, one after another, upon his toes—stacked exactly as they had first been arranged upon the desk.
"……."
Then Yeon So-hyeon simply slipped that foot free and set the pile softly down upon the floor. It was a feat of skill so extraordinary that no one would have believed it had been performed on pure impulse, without the least summoning of inner energy.
"……."
Yet Yeon So-hyeon's face held no flicker of satisfaction. He only watched to see whether his former wife had woken.
"……."
Fortunately, Moyong Un-jeong merely shifted once, as if her posture had grown uncomfortable, and seemed to sleep on.
Un-jeong…
Yeon So-hyeon reached out carefully and brushed back the few strands of hair that had fallen across her face—as if he feared even the accidental touch of his fingertips against her skin.
"You must feel it by now. You must know it."
Words he had once been told rose unbidden.
"The Heavenly Killing Star under which you were born is a destiny of ruin and death."
As if the mere brush of his fingertips might let that wicked fate of his devour her again, just as it had in days past.
"You will pile mountains of corpses and make seas of blood."
As if his deep guilt and deeper regret, and an anguish whose depths could not be sounded, might somehow pass into her.
"Whether you wish it or not."
He kept his distance, just as he had in those old days.
"……."
And yet—unlike those old days—he was not doing nothing.
Moyong Un-jeong was dreaming.
"Acting Great General, you say?"
Her own family was laughing at her.
"How absurd."
"She just trailed after Father all this time. Has she somehow fallen into some grand delusion?"
"Surely she doesn't seriously mean to become the head of our family?"
The men of the house made no secret of their distrust.
"Have you seen her going about with her hair unbound, covered in mud?"
"Running around hunting with common soldiers."
"She's a child unfit for our Great Moyong Family, which carries the blood of the royal house of Yan."
The women of the house refused even to keep company with her.
The northern war of that time had produced many heroes. As the Great General's house that had always guarded the north, the Moyong Family too had piled up many military merits. But the war had ended without victory or defeat—and only deep wounds remained.
"It's as good as a defeat!"
"Isn't this all because the Moyong Family failed to properly fulfill its role as the Great General's house?!"
"Don't talk to us of merits!"
"Wasn't that your duty to begin with?!"
From the power-holders hungry for someone to blame, the Moyong Family could never be free.
"We may need a new Great General."
"To protect the rights of our northern tribes, we need a man with the strength and authority to command everyone's respect!"
After her father, the Northern Great General, took to his sickbed, the noise from outside only grew louder.
"These days I can't even show my face outside!"
"We must stop our Moyong name from being dragged through the mud any further!"
"If our family cannot hold the office of Great General…"
Within, the discontent of those who would not relinquish the power they had long enjoyed rose higher still.
"Rather…"
"What if we raise up a new Northern Great General with our own hands?"
Her family turned its back on her. Her own blood abandoned her.
"What about the name 'King of Fear'?"
"Excellent."
"In the south they may laugh at so blatant a title—"
"But in this north, strength is order and truth itself. That plain name will be more effective."
The name of the King of Fear was first coined inside the Moyong Family itself.
"Are you out of your minds?! Our family head still lives—and you propose we raise a new Great General with our own hands?!"
"Come to your senses! Does a man who can neither speak nor move look alive to your eyes?!"
While the family split and fought day after day, she was alone. Horribly alone.
Standing on a barren winter plain where even the grasslands had withered dry, her frozen hands held only a single sword caked with blood and snow, hanging by a thread. But she had to endure. The soldiers of the Great General Headquarters believed in her and followed her—and so she endured.
Even as the northern wind howled madly, as if carving her skin with blades—beyond her earlobes, slowly necrotizing from frostbite—she heard a single thread of—
She listened.
It was the sound of a flute. Cutting through the ear-splitting screams of the northern wind racing unchecked across the open plains, what reached her was, without a doubt, the sound of a flute.
This melody…
The flute she had heard as a child—the one that had soothed her to the depths of her heart and warmed her entire body.
"……."
Before she knew it, the snow had cleared. Gazing at green shoots blooming blue all the way to the far edge of the field, she opened her eyes.
"Good morning."
And there he stood—by the window where the sun was rising, smiling a smile more radiant than the dazzling sunrise itself.
"Un-jeong."
On the desk, every last document that had plagued her for months lay neatly processed and stacked in order. Beside them sat a teacup with steam gently rising, the fragrance of deeply steeped leaves pleasantly tickling her nose.
"Good morning."
And so, even with a face still half-asleep, she could smile brightly.
"Eldest Young Master."
Because she was no longer alone.
"Waaaaah!"
At the sudden, unidentifiable roar from outside, Moyong Un-jeong—who had been cradling the warm teacup in both hands—nearly shot to her feet.
"It's all right."
Yeon So-hyeon, standing by the window, smiled and gestured for her to be at ease.
"What is it?"
Reassured, she set the teacup down carefully and approached him. Yeon So-hyeon pointed out the window.
"Good news has arrived."
"…Good news?"
When she looked outside, she could see at a glance a long procession that appeared to be a merchant caravan stretching down the street—and around it, people thronging blackly as they raised their voices.
"Waaaaah—!"
"Surely…?!"
The sharp-witted woman wore a look of startled surprise.
"Has the food already arrived?!"
Yeon So-hyeon smiled.
"Come, come! Form a line!"
"Keep order!"
Unlike usual, even the expressions of the soldiers maintaining order were bright.
"There's no need to rush!"
From atop a wagon, a caravan master was calling out with a bright face. He was a man of the Hwal-ro Merchant Caravan who had moved together with the chivalrous heroes of Luoyang's Spring.
"We'll distribute every last measure of food loaded on these carts, so there's no need to worry!"
The caravan workers who had crossed the grasslands through the night were unloading provisions with bright faces, ladling food out to the refugees with whatever came to hand—so there was none of the usual delay in distribution.
"Thank you! Thank you!"
"Blessings upon you!"
"W-wait a moment…!"
A duty general who had barely forced his way through the refugees shouted at the caravan master.
"If you just hand it all out like that, what do you expect us to do…?!"
The crowd had gathered like a swarm of ants, and control already seemed impossible.
"The military provisions?! We need to leave enough to stock the military storehouses…!"
Just as the caravan master was about to answer the flustered general—
"Hey, why are you so late?!"
An Song-gyeong of Daseonrang suddenly burst out and yelled.
"I've been waiting all night—I thought my eyes were going to fall out!"
"Haha, well. There were circumstances…"
While the two of them bickered, the duty general fretted beside them.
"No—first, the military storehouses… We need to stockpile…"
Someone tapped him on the shoulder.
"It's all right."
The duty general turned and looked startled.
"Eldest Young Master?!"
Eldest Young Master Yeon So-hyeon spoke to him reassuringly.
"This is only the first procession. The next ones will arrive soon. That's why I ordered everything distributed to the refugees—so set your mind at ease."
"The next processions will arrive soon, you say?!"
Passing the startled man, Yeon So-hyeon stepped forward, and the caravan master greeted him with a radiant face.
"Eldest Young Master!"
He clasped his hands formally and reported.
"Mission complete!"
"You've worked hard."
"Thank you!"
Yeon So-hyeon leapt lightly up beside him and called out.
"People of the Central Plains…!"
The gathered crowd sent up a cheer for him.
"Long live the Eldest Young Master!"
"Long live!"
Yeon So-hyeon waved his hands dismissively, as if to say they were wrong.
"What…?"
As the crowd that had been cheering him murmured in confusion, the Eldest Young Master grinned and raised his inner energy to speak.
He pointed to one side and called out.
She had followed him out—and now, with every gaze fixed upon her, Moyong Un-jeong looked flustered.
Then, from the crowd, a thunderous roar erupted.
"Long live the Great General!"
"Long live!"
Though she had been startled at first, her face as she awkwardly smiled and waved her hand—
"Long live!"
—looked brighter than at any other moment.