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Chapter 104
"Are you alright?"
Jeok Soya approached the ‌‌‌woman's spirit cautiously and asked.
The spirit looked down at her own form, then lifted her gaze to meet Soya's.
"So it was you who purified me. How did you manage it?"
"I'm Jeok Soya. You're the shield guardian who ‌protected Black Tortoise's divine treasure... aren't you?"
"Me? Ah. Yes. ‌‌‌‌‌There was a time when I held that role. It's a name I've longed for."
Her voice carried ‌‌‌‌a melancholic tone.
"Then this place is... the Hyun To Underground Palace. If so, then it was Hyun Rabaek who brought ‌‌‌me here."
The woman murmured bitterly as she surveyed the cavern around her.
Soya clenched her fists as she gazed at the woman who had once been Black Tortoise's shield guardian.
Three conditions were necessary to awaken the Divine Beast.
And one of them was direct ‌‌‌bloodline.
Because Hyun Rabaek had severed all of Black Tortoise's direct lineage long ago, only he possessed the blood of the direct line.
But if this woman before me truly was the shield guardian who protected Black Tortoise's ‌‌‌‌divine treasure, if she was one of the seven tribal leaders of the Northern Lands...
'This woman also qualifies as direct bloodline. I could awaken Black Tortoise without risking the danger of seeking out Hyun Rabaek.'
So Soya spoke with earnest urgency.
"Please help me. Hyun Rabaek has awakened Evil and is threatening the people. I must awaken Black Tortoise to stop him."
"What...?"
The woman flinched at those ‌‌words and asked back.
The ‌‌woman narrowed her eyes as she studied Soya, then seemed to realize something and murmured.
"...I see. I wondered how you awakened me."
The woman bowed her body toward Soya.
Then she slowly reached out and gently touched the teal-colored ribbon tied in Soya's hair.
"...?"
Soya looked ‌at the woman with ‌confusion, unable to understand what she was doing.
"I cannot help you, child. Forgive me, bride of the Yellow Dragon."
"But why...!"
"My body has already completed its span of life—I cannot awaken the Divine Beast."
"Ah..."
Soya looked at the corpse in the coffin the woman indicated.
The ‌‌‌purified woman's remains were finally succumbing ‌‌to the natural passage of time, slowly weathering away.
It was not only the woman's corpse.
The woman's spirit was also gradually becoming transparent.
The soul of the departed, bound to the earthly realm, was now preparing to depart for the world of the dead.
"Was it Hyun Rabaek who corrupted your spirit core?"
Soya understood how agonizing it was to ‌‌‌have one's spirit core corrupted.
As she recalled the woman who had become half-beast in that torment, a ‌‌wave of sorrow washed over her.
"It was not he who corrupted my spirit core."
"Then who on earth..."
"...."
The woman offered no response, merely letting out a soft, sliding laugh.
"Hyun Rabaek. His misguided choice forced you, a mere child, to walk a thorny path for all these long years. As one who once served as a ‌‌‌leader among the Seven Tribes of the Hyunmu Clan, I apologize to you in his stead."
The woman spoke with sorrowful eyes narrowed in melancholy.
"I must depart now and cannot stop him myself. I beseech you, young bride of the Yellow Dragon. Stop him in my place."
"...."
"And, should you possess...."
The woman spoke further, but her lips merely moved soundlessly—no words reached my ‌‌‌ears.
"Ah, how the veil of ‌‌‌time prevents my wishes from reaching you."
Realizing this, the ‌‌woman rose ‌‌with a lonely smile.
"The veil of time...?"
Jeok Soya asked, but the woman did not answer.
Instead, she offered counsel.
"Young bride of the Yellow Dragon, possessing a spirit clearer than any other. You are far too pure to harbor the heart of Destruction."
"...."
"Yet Evil shall never triumph over Goodness. So protect this land with your virtue."
With those words, both the woman's body and spirit departed.
Jeok Soya stood transfixed, staring at the place where the woman's spirit had vanished.
Clang—.
The seal of chains binding the shield unwound with a metallic sound.
'The seal...!'
Snapping to attention, Jeok Soya approached ‌‌the black shield and placed her hand upon it.
A cold, biting energy crept up through her skin, causing her fingertips to instinctively recoil. ‌‌‌
It was the opposite of what she felt when touching the Blue Dragon Extreme Sword.
'So this is the power that devours all living things....'
At that moment, Seol Yo cried out toward Jeok Soya.
"Someone's coming!"
The black water pooled on the cave floor trembled finely, and the sound of splashing echoed through the cavern.
Splash.
Splash.
Splash.
Jeok Soya lifted her head with a tense expression, gazing toward the cave entrance.
Soon, a man with long black hair trailing down to his ankles slowly came into view. ‌‌‌
"A visitor to the Underground Palace, yet how did you...."
The man, muttering in a desolate voice, suddenly stopped upon discovering the empty coffin.
"Siyeon...?"
In an instant, his pupils trembled violently, and his expression twisted ‌‌‌‌into something sinister.
"What have you done to her?"
* * *
There was an ancient prophecy passed down from time immemorial.
[On the night when the crimson moon rises, the bride of the Yellow ‌‌Dragon ‌‌‌shall awaken the Four Sacred Beasts that ‌‌‌‌slumber and sweep away the darkness scattered across this land, bringing peace.]
The bride of the Yellow Dragon—an existence that encompasses all Four Sacred Beasts and pursues harmony to prevent the Yellow Dragon's formidable power from being misused.
For generations, people awaited the day when the true bride of the Yellow Dragon spoken of in the oracle would appear.
Yet the Imperial Family itself did not wish for the birth of an existence that surpassed the power of the Yellow Dragon, the Son of Heaven.
If someone were to ‌‌awaken the Four Sacred Beasts, that task should rightfully belong to the Son of Heaven who rules this world.
Thus, the previous Emperor resorted to dark ‌‌magic, seeking to absorb the power of the Empress's spirit core.
But the dark magic ‌‌failed.
The Empress's ‌spirit core began to blacken ‌‌with corruption, and her body gradually weakened.
At some point, even her own son could no longer visit his mother.
The palace attendants turned away visitors under the pretense that the Empress was unwell, but in truth, by that time her spirit core had become so thoroughly corrupted that she had taken on an appearance nearly that of a demon.
Yet the Emperor, ‌‌unwilling to relinquish that power, confined the Empress to her bedchamber and continued attempting dark magic upon her.
Then, twelve years ago, on the night when the oracle's 'crimson moon' rose.
The Empress died.
More precisely, she was killed.
Seeing the crimson moon rising above the dark sky and suddenly fearing that she might awaken the Four Sacred Beasts to exact her revenge, the Emperor ‌‌‌murdered ‌‌the Empress.
Hyun Rabaek, the patriarch of the Hyunmu Clan, attended the Empress's funeral as the clan's representative.
Unable to accept her death, Hyun Rabaek wept before her coffin when he suddenly noticed something amiss.
Pursuing the faint traces of dark magic he sensed, he ultimately uncovered all the heinous acts the Imperial Family had committed against her, and his fury knew no bounds.
Hyun Rabaek took her body, which he had smuggled away, and returned to the Northern Lands, where he wailed for days and nights. ‌‌‌
Her ‌‌‌spirit, corrupted even unto its essence, was denied the mercy of departing the earth and finding peace.
The Empress was originally the leader of the Silk Snake Tribe, one of the Seven Tribes of the Northern Lands, and the guardian ‌‌‌of the Black Tortoise's Iron Shield, the divine artifact of the North.
And at the same time, she ‌was Hyun Rabaek's former lover with whom he had pledged eternal love.
Yet when the Emperor designated her as his consort, they were forced to part.
Hyun Rabaek had urged her to flee with him in the dead of night, but she refused, speaking of ‌‌‌‌her duty to her lineage.
Thus he had to let her go.
But then....
To subject the woman he had brought to such a fate to such unspeakable horrors!
What is the bride of the Yellow Dragon, after all? What is the power of these divine beasts?
If only he had cast aside the duty to his lineage and somehow persuaded her to ‌flee with him....
Would a different ending have awaited them then?
Such thoughts tormented him endlessly.
And through that anguish, Evil crept in, beginning ‌‌‌‌‌to shake him with its cunning voice.
―Isn't it terrible? The duty to your lineage that made you abandon your lover, and the bride of the Yellow ‌‌‌Dragon that drove your lover to death.
―Take my hand. I will exact ‌‌‌revenge upon all of them for you. Awaken me and accept me. You shall ‌‌‌become the true evil of this world.
The mission originally imposed upon the Hyunmu ‌‌‌‌Clan was to guard against the awakening of the evil sealed ‌‌in the Northern Lands.
But his weakened spirit was gradually consumed by Evil's whispers.... ‌‌
'Yes. This terrible world deserves proper punishment.'
'Thus, if only I could destroy this world....'
Hyun Rabaek, driven to madness at last, broke the taboo and awakened the ancient evil that lay sealed.
The moment he accepted Evil, a burning agony erupted from his spirit core.
Yet this suffering was nothing compared to the anguish she would have endured ‌‌‌within the Imperial Palace.
He ‌‌‌became Evil itself, accepting the darkness into his very soul with the hope that the world would be destroyed, enduring the torment to achieve it.
He despised being the Yellow Dragon's consort, despised the obligations of his bloodline.
There was only one thing he desired.
To annihilate the Imperial Family that had driven his former beloved to a terrible death, and the land of the Divine Beasts that had imposed upon ‌‌‌her the burden of bloodline duty.
The greatest obstacle to his purpose was none other than the Four Great Families, who claimed to protect the Empire.
Thus, he first annihilated the Hyunmu Clan of the Northern Region.
His wife, born of the Black Serpent Tribe, whom he had been forced to marry, and even his young child—all of them.
Yet he could not destroy the divine relic that his former beloved, once the shield-bearer of the Hyunmu Clan, had protected; instead, he sealed it away together with her coffin, storing it deep within a cave.
When he learned that intruders hiding in the Underground Palace ‌‌‌were heading toward this cave.
Hyun Rabaek, who had grown indifferent to all things since her departure, felt his emotions stir for the first time in ages.
And when he discovered that ‌‌‌her coffin was ‌‌‌‌empty.
"What have you done to her?"
His surging rage turned toward the small girl standing before him.

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Brought to you by Valir Scans! ‌‌To support our team and enjoy the latest releases, please read directly on our official site: valirscans.org
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