A Baby Cat Who Commands the Dog Clan - Chapter 18

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

Chapter 18
It was Nam Goong Ho who rescued Hong Seol each time.
“You ruffians! Seol is still shy around strangers.”
“Yelp!”
Watching them tuck tail and flee at a single command from Nam Goong Ho was almost amusing.
Yet Nam Goong Heuk and Nam Goong Jeok returned to the Chang Cheon Pavilion the very next day.
They came bearing bamboo balls and wooden figurines in their hands, eager to play.
Their eyes sparkled with such pure innocence that they hardly seemed like bad children—merely a touch too curious.
‘They say all the beast-humans of the Nam Goong Family are cruel… but this is nothing like what I heard back at the Myo Family Estate.’
Truth be told, I was curious about the three brothers myself. Until now, my only peers had been the wretched cadet twins from the Myo Family Estate.
But I was far too timid to play freely with them.
‘If they discover I’m a cat beast-human, the Nam Goong Family will cast me out. I have no choice but to be cautious.’
I hung my head in disappointment when—
“Oh? There’s the little one!”
“Really, big brother!”
As if on cue, Nam Goong Heuk, the second son, and Nam Goong Jeok, the youngest, appeared. Nam Goong Heuk carried a small lute strapped across his back—where he’d procured it, I couldn’t say.
I startled at the sight of them.
“Mother!”
I spun around in panic, but it was far too late to pretend I hadn’t seen them.
The two young masters approached with tremendous momentum. From a distance, I could almost imagine tails wagging behind their hips as they charged toward me.
“What a coincidence to meet you here!”
A coincidence? We lived in the same house!
Nam Goong Heuk, now standing directly before my face, wore a look of disappointment.
“Hey! Why did you pretend not to see us?”
My fingertips trembled from nerves, but I refused to lose face.
Perhaps it was thanks to my rigorous physical training with the Changcheon Master, but a strange confidence welled up inside me.
I answered immediately.
“I-I wasn’t pretending not to see you.”
“You just did, though.”
He was sharp!
With nothing left to say, I clamped my mouth shut. The two young masters circled around me gleefully.
“Why is no one with you today? Now I can finally see your face properly.”
Nam Goong Heuk smiled brightly as he examined my open face.
“You’re really cute. Are all little girls like this?”
Upon hearing this, Nam Goong Jeok shook his head vigorously.
“No, big brother. She’s not cute—she’s pretty!”
“Is that so.”
Heuk and Jeok were mischievous, but their nature was genuinely kind. It was surely because they had grown up surrounded by nothing but love, wanting for nothing.
Witnessing their father cherish their mother like a precious jade throughout his life must have influenced them as well.
“Father said a man should always make a woman smile. You have such a cute face—why do you always look so gloomy?”
“Exactly!”
Nam Goong Heuk and Nam Goong Jeok were intensely curious about Hong Seol.
The fact that they’d rarely had the chance to properly interact with a girl only fueled the brothers’ fascination.
And a cat-human at that!
It was hardly surprising that Nam Goong Heuk and Nam Goong Jeok’s eyes sparkled with eagerness to befriend Hong Seol.
But Hong Seol, who had never received kindness from peers her own age, couldn’t quite grasp the situation.
She merely hunched her body, tense and guarded.
Nam Goong Heuk suddenly posed a question to her.
“Hey! Want to play ball with us?”
“No, thank you.”
“What about racing then, older sister?”
That too, she disliked!
Hong Seol shook her head vigorously.
‘If I let myself relax and run even a little, I’ll get excited without realizing it, and my cat ears will pop right out.’
Then these brothers’ curiosity would instantly transform into disgust.
Nam Goong Heuk scratched the back of his head.
“What about shape-shifting and fetching a stick? You’d hate that too, right? Since you’re a cat.”
That’s true… wait?
Hong Seol, who had been nodding absently, suddenly froze. Her face drained of color in an instant.
‘I-I’ve been exposed! They knew I was a cat all along!’
Her body trembled violently. Hong Seol barely managed to lift her head, ready to transform into a cat and leap over the wall to escape if they attacked.
‘…Huh?’
Yet strangely, neither of them showed any sign of attacking her throat. Instead, their faces were brimming with excitement.
“We figured you would, so we prepared something. Here!”
Nam Goong Heuk pulled something from his pouch. It was a cloth mouse doll. Its back was fitted with several layers of tightly braided silk thread, and the end was connected to a smoothly carved wooden stick.
Unmistakably a toy made for a cat.
“What do you think? Can we play together with this?”
Hong Seol, who had been standing in a daze, relaxed as her tension melted away, her eyebrows forming an inverted V-shape as she asked Nam Goong Heuk.
“You… don’t hate me?”
“Why would we hate you?”
“Because I’m a cat-human, different from you…”
“That’s exactly why playing together will be twice as fun!”
Nam Goong Heuk dangled the mouse doll before Hong Seol’s eyes. Her pupils tracked his movements, swaying left and right.
“We pestered our chamberlain for three whole days to make this. Hold out your hand.”
As Hong Seol extended her hand, the cloth mouse doll gently settled into her palm.
“It’s a gift. Do you like it?”
The doll’s body was made from gray fabric scraps left over from sewing martial robes, with black knots for eyes and nose. Its tail was a leather cord braided in three strands.
“Oh, and we carved your name on it too!”
At those words, the joy that had swelled in Hong Seol’s heart suddenly deflated.
‘I… I never learned to read…’
These children assumed I naturally knew how to read, so they must have engraved my name on the doll.
The fact that I couldn’t read felt like a mark of being unloved, and my eyelashes drooped.
“Ah, well, actually I…”
Before I could finish speaking, the youngest, Nam Goong Jeok, spoke with sparkling eyes.
“Turn the doll over, Sister!”
Hesitantly, I flipped the cloth mouse at Nam Goong Jeok’s urging.
“I can’t read… huh?”
There, embroidered in delicate pink thread, was a snow flower pattern. Nam Goong Heuk spoke proudly.
“Even if you can’t read, you can tell this is your name, right?”
“Oh!”
I gently traced the fine embroidery with my fingertips. It felt as though their warm consideration for me was woven into every stitch.
My neck grew hot as if I’d caught a cold, and the tip of my nose burned as if I’d bitten into ginger.
“It’s so, so beautiful. Thank you, young masters.”
“Don’t mention it.”
Nam Goong Heuk puffed out his chest proudly.
“Call me older brother instead of young master!”
“And call me Jeok!”
At their affectionate words tumbling out in competition, my eyes grew misty.
“I, if it’s alright, I’d like to give you this in return…”
I carefully extended both hands toward Nam Goong Heuk. In my palms lay a blue silk ribbon.
One side of my hair, which had been twisted up in two sections, had come loose and fluttered in the breeze.
“I don’t have much to give…”
Everything I owned had been given to me by the Nam Goong Family—from clothes to toys.
Seeing me downhearted, Mae Ran had made me a new silk ribbon, claiming she’d exchanged my old clothes and silk scraps for it.
Of course, it was a lie. No merchant would trade rags for silk, no matter how much leftover fabric it was.
But unaware of this, the silk ribbon was the only thing I truly owned.
“It might look a bit plain, but like this!”
My fingers moved deftly, and soon a chrysanthemum bloomed in my palm.
It was made using the knotting technique Mae Ran had taught me bit by bit.
“It’ll look pretty as a waist ornament.”
I handed the knot to Nam Goong Heuk and watched his reaction. He opened his eyes wide and traced the knot with his fingertips.
‘Does he… not like it?’
A young master of the Nam Goong Family would have lacked for nothing since childhood.
I wondered if I’d done something foolish, getting excited over receiving kindness from a peer for the first time.

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————