Chapter 293
Translator: Ace
Chapter: 293
Chapter Title: It's Yours
Thud. Thud.
Ha Mu-baek's footsteps echoed on the wooden stairs of the inn.
Umun Gayul followed lightly behind him.
The people she passed glanced at her furtively.
Her beauty couldn't be fully concealed by the face cloth.
They arrived at a door on the fifth floor.
It was the topmost floor of the inn.
Knock knock.
Ha Mu-baek knocked lightly on the door.
To let her know they had arrived.
If he just burst in, she might mistake them for enemies and leap out the window.
"Wh-who is it?"
A rough voice came from inside.
"It's Instructor Ha."
Ha Mu-baek answered calmly.
"......"
There was no reply.
All he could sense was Gongya Hwiyeon's presence hesitating before the door.
"I-is it really Instructor Ha?"
The cautious voice came again.
It was still hoarse and raspy.
And it wasn't like her at all. She must have been deeply shocked by this incident.
She had experienced powerlessness before overwhelming strength for the first time.
She was cowering in fear.
At her daughter's voice, a look of pity crossed Umun Gayul's face.
A voice wasn't something easily changed.
There were martial arts that infused inner energy into the vocal cords to alter the voice, but her daughter hadn't reached that level yet.
That meant she had used medicine.
Umun Gayul knew all about it.
'She was truly desperate.'
Her heart ached at the realization.
"Yes. It's me."
Ha Mu-baek's short reply.
There was no response.
Ha Mu-baek waited patiently without urging her.
"H-how will you prove you're Instructor Ha?"
Even after hearing his voice, she didn't trust easily.
The rough, cracked voice was filled with fear.
"You've heard my voice, haven't you?"
"You can change it."
The immediate retort.
"You. Do you even realize how outrageous your actions have been? Go back. I told you clearly. Go back quickly."
Ha Mu-baek said calmly.
It was during the height of the Summer Combat Festival.
A conversation he'd had alone with Gongya Hwiyeon on Mount Mokran.
Only Ha Mu-baek and Gongya Hwiyeon knew those words.
If she remembered that conversation, she would believe it was him.
Clunk.
The careful sound of the door's bolt being undone.
Creeeak.
The door opened slightly.
Through the gap, the face of an ordinary-looking man appeared.
It was Gongya Hwiyeon with her face altered.
Only after confirming Ha Mu-baek's appearance did she fling the door wide open.
"I-Instructor! Wh-where's... Mother...?"
A voice thick with emotion. But still raspy and grating, like scraping metal.
"Y-Yeonie..."
A choked voice came from behind Ha Mu-baek.
Gongya Hwiyeon's gaze turned to his back.
A small figure hidden behind the broad-backed Ha Mu-baek.
Umun Gayul.
Only now spotting her, Gongya Hwiyeon cried out.
"M-Mom!"
She threw herself into her arms.
Umun Gayul embraced her daughter, who looked like a man.
"Yeonie. Yeonie. Yeonie."
Tears flowed from both their eyes.
"Why don't you come inside first? Benefactor."
She had blocked the sound with inner energy.
But it was a place where people could pass by at any moment.
Umun Gayul nodded at Ha Mu-baek's words, gripping Gongya Hwiyeon's hand tightly as they entered the room.
Ha Mu-baek followed, closing the door behind him.
"Come here, my girl. Let me see your face."
Once inside, Umun Gayul stroked Gongya Hwiyeon's face.
She gazed lovingly at the ordinary man's face, complete with dark stubble.
It was a scene that looked plenty strange.
Yet the atmosphere between them overflowed with tender affection and love.
Ha Mu-baek said nothing more.
He had no intention of interrupting their mother-daughter reunion.
He quietly sat at the table by the window, gazing outside.
The teapot was full of cold tea.
He poured the cooled tea into a cup and brought it to his lips.
Just an ordinary aroma, just an ordinary taste.
It was common tea, nothing special.
But what did it matter?
Ha Mu-baek gazed at the scenery outside with a smile.
At least in this moment.
For Umun Gayul and Gongya Hwiyeon.
It was one of the happiest times in their lives.
After a short while.
The two, who had been holding each other tightly, pulled back slightly. Their arms still embraced each other.
"Mom! No, Mother... Are you okay? That monstrous monk didn't do anything awful to you, right?"
Gongya Hwiyeon's gaze went to the roughly bandaged right shoulder area.
"You sent Great Hero Ha in time, so nothing happened."
Umun Gayul replied with a warm smile.
"But how long are you going to stay like that? This mother wants to see her daughter's real face."
"Ah!"
At Umun Gayul's words, Gongya Hwiyeon became aware of her state.
"Just a moment."
She finally released her arms and stepped back two paces.
At that instant.
Her face began to change.
It started with her throat.
Her Adam's apple seemed to shrink and vanish, then the skin slowly rolled upward.
Ha Mu-baek watched this scene with curious eyes.
His posture, which had been facing the window, had shifted to face Gongya Hwiyeon.
The rolling skin passed her chin.
Lips, cheeks, ears, nose, eyes—it all rolled up.
Finally, even her forehead rolled away, dropping a rolled-up scroll of flesh-colored skin into Gongya Hwiyeon's palm like a tube.
That scroll was the Myriad Transformation Face Mask.
Gongya Hwiyeon's revealed beauty was blinding.
It was beauty worthy of her place among the Five Flowers of the Martial World as the Colorful Flower.
The disparity between her pale hands and sallow face was gone.
A face white as white jade.
And her sharp, distinct features.
Were an exact mirror of the beauty facing her, Umun Gayul's.
If Umun Gayul's was mature allure at its peak, Gongya Hwiyeon's was youthful freshness at its peak.
Anyone could tell at a glance they were mother and daughter.
'If I'd seen Gongya Hwiyeon's true face sooner, I might have gotten a clue about my benefactor.'
Ha Mu-baek thought as he watched the two facing each other.
He felt a twinge of regret for not checking earlier.
But it didn't matter now.
They had met like this.
With their reunion seemingly over, Ha Mu-baek rose from his chair.
"Here. Take it."
The first thing he did was return the Four Thunderclap Bow to its owner.
"Ah...?"
It was the bow she had glimpsed amid the urgency of meeting Ha Mu-baek.
She had been secretly awed by its elegant, refined form.
And from its aura, she had known it was her cherished weapon.
"Four Thunderclap Bow. It's yours."
At Ha Mu-baek's words, she reached out.
The moment Gongya Hwiyeon grasped the bow's grip.
Ha Mu-baek and Gongya Hwiyeon were both holding the Four Thunderclap Bow.
At that moment.
As if knowing it was passing from Ha Mu-baek to Gongya Hwiyeon.
The Four Thunderclap Bow trembled faintly.
As if refusing to leave Ha Mu-baek's hand.
Gongya Hwiyeon flinched in surprise.
Even though it was clearly hers, it felt like it was pushing her away.
Flustered, Gongya Hwiyeon didn't know what to do.
The bow's trembling grew rougher.
Gongya Hwiyeon looked back and forth between Umun Gayul and Ha Mu-baek.
Umun Gayul just smiled silently, watching.
Ha Mu-baek said,
"It's yours. It's up to you now."
The Four Thunderclap Bow trembled even more violently.
Gongya Hwiyeon gripped it tightly.
"M-Mother..."
She looked at Umun Gayul in panic.
"It's yours. Infuse it with your inner energy, or leave it be for a few days. It's resisting now because it tasted Great Hero Ha's martial arts. Time will sort it out."
At her mother's words, Gongya Hwiyeon poured her inner energy into the writhing bow.
The Four Thunderclap Bow, which had thrashed as if about to expel the energy.
As her inner energy kept flowing in, its trembling gradually subsided, as if giving up, and soon stopped.
Instead.
Its form had changed too.
Back to the ordinary iron bow Ha Mu-baek had first seen.
The aura emanating from it had also sharply diminished.
It was truly a wondrous object, a divine weapon.
"Hoo..."
Gongya Hwiyeon looked at the Four Thunderclap Bow with eyes full of regret and disappointment.
How much she had cherished it all this time.
Of course, she had set it aside briefly for her escape.
Still, this was too much.
As if understanding her daughter's feelings, Umun Gayul's smile deepened.
"Oh, but Mother. Earlier, Instructor Ha called you 'benefactor.' What was that about...?"
Gongya Hwiyeon recalled the word she'd overheard and asked with a puzzled face.
"It was a small connection from the past."
Umun Gayul answered nonchalantly.
However.
"My younger sister and I received a life-saving debt from her."
Ha Mu-baek replied in a serious tone.
At his answer, Gongya Hwiyeon's eyes widened round.
A life-saving debt?
To the world's greatest martial artist?
It was shocking.
No, more than that—her mother had been confined to the Punishment Cave all this time, so how...?
"It was when I was twelve."
"Ah..."
Gongya Hwiyeon's face showed understanding at last.
That age made it possible.
Ha Mu-baek at twelve.
It was hard for Gongya Hwiyeon to imagine.
"Mother. What was Instructor Ha like at twelve...?"
Gongya Hwiyeon's words cut off abruptly.
She had been calculating when he was twelve, recalling his current age.
Nineteen years ago.
She had been just learning to toddle. Too young for any memories.
And.
That was around when her mother was confined to the Punishment Cave.
No one had ever told her why her mother was imprisoned there.
She had only roughly figured it out herself.
But the timing was too uncanny.
"Uh, so... that is, uh..."
She seemed plunged into confusion.
Gongya Hwiyeon couldn't find the words.
Umun Gayul smiled gently.
"Fate is like that by nature."
Then she explained that day's events in detail.
Ha Mu-baek occasionally chimed in about the circumstances.
And.
What happened afterward.
Events in Umun Gayul's life that Ha Mu-baek didn't know.
Events in Ha Mu-baek and his siblings' lives that Umun Gayul didn't know.
Once the stories were all told.
The three fell into their own thoughts.
'Sa Hwa Alliance...'
Ha Mu-baek recalled Alliance Leader Gong Ya Jang-cheon.
It was ambiguous and complicated.
He might need to pour out his anger for how his benefactor had been treated.
But she said it was her own choice.
What kind of man was Gongya Hwiyeon's father to act so pettily?
Ha Mu-baek couldn't intervene rashly in that.
It was ultimately between Gong Ya Jeong-mun and Umun Gayul.
A matter between husband and wife.
There was no room for an outsider like him.
Gongya Hwiyeon looked back and forth between Ha Mu-baek and Umun Gayul with a complicated expression.
The world's greatest, her idol.
To think his childhood was the trigger for her mother's confinement.
Of course, Ha Mu-baek was not at fault.
Things had just unfolded that way—no one's blame.
That was Gongya Hwiyeon's thought.
But her heart was still tangled.
Unlike the two with stern faces, Umun Gayul looked at Ha Mu-baek with pride.
She had heard roughly on the way here.
Hearing the details again.
It was impressive and admirable.
And that sickly girl, who seemed like she'd blow away in a puff of wind, had overcome her illness and become healthy.
That girl had kept Umun Gayul's feet anchored until the end.
Around the same age as her own daughter.
Even in her disheveled, exhausted state, her prettiness shone through.
Even in the Punishment Cave, she had wondered about that girl.
Now she was perfectly healthy.
A second-year in the Fierce Dragon Corps, Gongya Hwiyeon's senior.
There was no greater joy or pride.
Thus, the three's reunion came to an end.
Ha Mu-baek looked at Gongya Hwiyeon.
"Why?"
"Something I need to check. Your condition—that damned monk seems to have done something tricky."
At Ha Mu-baek's answer.
For a moment.
A heavy air flowed.
Gongya Hwiyeon and Umun Gayul had both experienced that monstrous monk's prowess.
For such a guy to have pulled some trick.
It meant it wasn't over yet.
"Excuse me for a moment."
Ha Mu-baek activated the Infinite Bright Wheel Eye and took Gongya Hwiyeon's pulse.
Carefully channeling his inner energy along her meridian.
With the Infinite Bright Wheel Eye, he searched for the foreign energy nestled small inside her.