Chapter 153
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 153
“Ah… Ah…”
As if struck by a sudden, agonizing realization, Jeok Ah-yun’s face slowly became saturated with despair.
Jeok Yeong watched him blankly for a moment before turning away. As he did, the thin veneer of a smile he had been wearing vanished instantly.
The Clan Head would probably give me a piece of his mind for speaking out of turn if he knew…
But the things their Young Lady had endured at the hands of that family were simply too unjust.
Jeok Yeong couldn't have held his tongue even if he wanted to. He felt he wouldn't be satisfied until he saw them writhing in a pain worse than death once they learned the truth.
Perhaps, as his superior often told him, he really was a fox with a rather nasty streak.
* * *
Stumble, stagger…
On the way back to his quarters, Jeok Ah-yun’s footsteps faltered repeatedly. His head spun, and his stomach twisted into knots.
“Ugh…”
Unable to suppress the rising bile, he grabbed a wooden pillar and retched.
“Ugh… hic… ugh…”
There were three conditions to awaken a Divine Beast: the blood of the direct lineage, the heart of the Divine Beast, and a spiritual body.
The Vermilion Bird Treasure Bow, crafted from the spiritual body of the Vermilion Bird, was kept in the shrine—a place difficult for most to access. However, before that, it had hung on the wall of his wife’s room while she served as the bow-keeper.
Therefore, if the child had awakened the Divine Beast, it must have happened in that brief window of less than fifteen days between her birth and his wife’s passing.
And the heart of the Divine Beast Vermilion Bird was one of purification and healing…
Only a heart so pure that it desired to heal another could awaken the Vermilion Bird.
In his now-faded memories, the physician had said his wife had passed the critical point. She had held on for ten more days, cradling the child, before finally closing her eyes. At the time, the physician had called those ten days a miracle granted by the Heavenly God.
Back then, he had simply thought his wife was a strong woman who had endured through sheer willpower.
But now, he finally understood. He knew exactly who had brought about that miracle… and what the child had paid as the price for it.
“It can’t be… this can’t be happening.”
Thick tears rolled down his hideously distorted face.
“So-ya… So-ya was… hic…”
The snow-white downy hair he had called disgusting was the result of that child’s pure, pitiful heart trying to save her mother. And he, her foolish, idiotic father, had failed to recognize it.
“So-ya… My daughter… So-ya… To So-ya… I…”
Broken fragments of words spilled from his lips.
[Cheep?]
He remembered So-ya, who had come toddling toward him after her first beast transformation.
[Pyah!]
He remembered the moment he had heartlessly shoved away that tiny body as she tried to grab his hand with a bright smile.
[Ppiyat…?]
He remembered that small child, tumbling over and looking up at him with a bewildered face…
He had stolen the child’s spirit core. Then, he had banished her to the Cold Palace so she would never cross his sight again. While he had turned his back on the world and lived like a madman out of resentment for his wife, the child had been forced to spend a long, lonely time there all by herself.
And when he faced the child again three years later…
[Father! I want that girl as Ri-ri’s maid! Please let Ri-ri have her!]
[Of course, Ri-ri. Is there anything I wouldn't do for you?]
Reunited in the worst possible way, the child had merely bowed her head before him without a hint of resentment. He had pointedly doted on Ri-ri right in front of the girl who had become Ri-ri’s servant. Even when he saw Ri-ri pushing So-ya, he only cared for Ri-ri.
The memory of the day he had ignored the child standing forlornly in the hallway outside Ri-ri’s room and walked right past her returned with a sharp pang of pain.
The next day, the child had left the mansion and never returned.
“What… what have I done all this time…?”
As the man finally realized the horrific things he had committed, his heart let out a scream of agony. Tears and saliva mixed together, dripping from his face.
What was even more terrible was that even after reuniting at the Imperial Palace, the child had given him several chances, yet he had thrown them away with his own hands.
[In the end, throughout all those countless moments, you consistently chose Ri-ri.]
[Not for a single moment was I ever an option for you.]
He had wanted to seize those chances because of the strange longing for the child he had harbored all along, but at the same time, he couldn't let go of Ri-ri. Thus, until the very last moment, he had turned away from So-ya and chosen Ri-ri.
He had shielded Ri-ri after she tried to kill So-ya… and he had even begged for her forgiveness on Ri-ri’s behalf.
When the child asked if he wouldn't regret it, he had said Ri-ri was his everything…
“Ugh, hic, So-ya… So-ya… So-ya…”
He remembered the cold gaze So-ya had directed at him. Even then, the child must have already known—that he was her biological father.
“Your father… your father was wrong… I…”
Knowing everything, what must the child have felt as she watched him protect Ri-ri? He couldn't even begin to fathom the depth of that pain.
“I was… wrong… hic, ugh, blurgh…”
His staggering body collapsed onto the sour vomit he had just heaved up. The foolish father, who had failed to recognize and then discarded his own child, wallowed in the foul stench, howling like a beast.
* * *
San-yu, who had collapsed alone in the rear garden, was moved to his quarters with the help of a palace attendant who found him.
When he opened his eyes the next morning, he realized his shoulders were throbbing with pain for some reason.
“It hurts as if someone beat me up.”
“Haha, who would dare lay a hand on the First Young Lord of the Vermilion Bird Clan?” the family servant said with a laugh while tidying the room. “By the way, things were truly chaotic last night.”
The servant recounted the upheaval that had occurred within the Imperial Palace while San-yu was asleep.
“The people treated by the Cuckoo turned into demonic beasts…?”
San-yu’s brow furrowed at those words. In his hazy memory, he felt like he could almost remember where his recollection of the previous night had cut off.
Right, I’m certain that at the very end… I ran into Lord Ga-ya…
As San-yu searched his memories with a disgruntled expression, a very strange sentence reached his ears.
“…?”
He abruptly stopped searching his mind and lifted his head. He couldn't easily process what the servant had just told him. Was the man playing a prank on him? If so, it was a very cruel and unfunny joke.
However, seeing the servant’s grave expression, San-yu gradually realized it wasn't a joke.
Thump! He bolted upright.
“Yo-Young Lord? Where are you going all of a sudden… Young Lord!”
He heard the servant’s voice calling after him, but San-yu immediately leaped through the window and ran toward the White Tiger Clan’s quarters.
He had to find So-ya right now. He had to go to her and…
Arriving before the White Tiger Clan’s pavilion, San-yu panted heavily, trying to catch his breath. He spotted So-ya in the front courtyard, enjoying the flowers with the White Tiger Young Lords.
“So-ya!”
“Brother San-yu?”
So-ya stood up as she noticed San-yu approaching.
“So-ya, your body…”
San-yu’s voice trembled slightly as he approached her.
“Is your body… okay?”
“Yes, Brother. My body is very strong.”
So-ya answered with a brave smile, but San-yu’s face looked more and more like he was about to burst into tears. Seeing his expression, So-ya seemed to understand why he looked that way.
“I… I heard a story…”
“…”
“That you… spread your wings and soared so magnificently…”
San-yu couldn't finish his sentence and squeezed his eyes shut before opening them again. So-ya’s expression also grew heavy and somber as she looked at him.
Brother San-yu must have heard everything that happened yesterday.
She knew he would be very sad if he found out. But why did she feel so upset and sorrowful as well?
“You know, Brother. We made a promise. That we would fly together next time.”
So-ya spoke, suppressing the emotions welling up inside her.
“We promised to flap our wings vigorously and fly together, climbing high mountains and piercing through the clouds.”
So-ya gripped San-yu’s sleeve tightly and gave him a wide smile.
“So, do you want to go flying with me?”
“…”
San-yu stared silently at the small hand holding onto him before gently wrapping his own hand over hers.
“Yes, So-ya.”
Then, following his sister’s lead, he pulled the corners of his mouth up, his eyes crinkling.
“Let’s fly together with your brother.”
Thick tears streamed down his face even as he smiled brightly.
“Yes, Brother.”
So-ya’s eyes also turned red as she smiled, her eyes crinkling beautifully.