Appearance of the Heavenly Demon - Chapter 20

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 20
* * *
Un Hyeon carried the young servant’s body up from the Valley.
He had removed his cloth wrapping and wound it around the remains, so Gwan Hyeok and Yeon Woo could not see the dreadful sight.
Yet the children understood.
Their peer—their companion, their friend—who had laughed and chattered beside them only hours before, now lay wrapped and still.
“Seok… Seok! What… what is this…? Ugghhh— Seok, no!”
Gwan Hyeok’s cry tore from him like a wail.
The boy had been his servant only because he lacked peers to ease his loneliness.
After his brother’s death, he had kept the servant close—five years now of constant companionship.
Master and servant they may have been, yet the two were friends.
Through joy and anger, mountain and field, wandering the Village together—they had done it all as companions.
And now that companion was dead.
Simply gone.
“Uhhhhhhh—!!”
Un Hyeon waited in silence, letting Gwan Hyeok grieve as long as he needed.
Though the night was late, he did not hurry him.
Yeon Woo stood beside Un Hyeon and watched Gwan Hyeok, but shed no tears.
Once Gwan Hyeok had composed himself somewhat, the three descended toward the Village.
The distance was manageable even at a child’s pace.
Before they reached the Village, Un Hyeon donned a half-mask.
Gwan Hyeok would not recognize him anyway, but among the adults of the Village, there were those who might know his face.
Flanking Un Hyeon on either side, Yeon Woo and Gwan Hyeok followed as he carried the cloth-wrapped body.
Gwan Hyeok continued to sniffle all the way into the Village, while Yeon Woo cast glances toward him as they walked.
They arrived at the Gwan Household.
“Gwan Hyeok!!”
The Gwan Household was in chaos.
They had kept lights burning through the dark night, searching for the vanished children.
The moment the three appeared, Gwan Hyeok’s mother rushed out and pulled him into her arms.
“Mother… sob, Seok… Seok, no—!!”
Gwan Hyeok burst into tears again, cradled in his mother’s embrace.
Hearing the commotion, the Gwan Household’s servants emerged.
The sight of the small Seok returned as a corpse struck them with shock; several collapsed where they stood, their legs giving way.
“Seok! Oh, my boy!! Seok!!”
Seok’s parents rushed out and seized his body, their cries shaking the household.
Watching their grief, those who had stood in stunned silence began to weep, one by one.
Soon after, the news reached Gwan Yoon, the household master, and Baek Gang, the martial commander, as well as the Gwan Household’s martial artists who had been out searching. All returned.
Gwan Yoon felt relief, above all else, that his own son had returned safely.
Yet he did not let this show outwardly.
As befitted the master of the Gwan Household, he stood silent in solidarity with the death and sorrow of the young servant.
As darkness fell on the night.
The lights of the Gwan Household would not be extinguished for a long time.
The mourning for the young servant’s death rippled across the entire Village, beyond the household walls.
* * *
“Ugh… ughhhh….”
Before a dark Cave, beneath a shallow cliff.
The blood-soaked man, gripped by the collar, gasped for breath and surveyed his surroundings.
Corpses of his dead subordinates lay strewn about him.
Those incompetent fools had brought in not the target, not even the Gwan Household’s son, but some random child with no connection whatsoever.
And then they’d insisted the boy might be linked to the Gwan Household, so he’d ordered them to simply throw him off the Cliff and be done with it.
But had the child actually been connected to them after all?
“Y-you… how could you….”
The man stared at the one gripping his collar, his voice trembling and unsteady.
Am Yeong Ma Gun.
One of the Twelve Demon Generals that upheld the Cheonma Singyou—the one said to receive the most favor from the Grand Master himself.
“That’s the problem, though. You should have known better than to touch him at all. I gave you fair warning, didn’t I?”
Had severing the nose and ears of the assassin he’d captured before and sending them back not been warning enough?
“Should I have sent a whole head? Or scattered his limbs across the countryside?”
“Th-that was you…!”
Am Yeong Ma Gun, it was.
Regrettably, the warning sent by Am Yeong Ma Gun only provoked the assassins further.
Seeing a portion of their comrade and subordinate fall, their killing intent swelled and clouded their judgment.
“Well, in any case. You’ll have to pay the price for ignoring my warning, won’t you?”
“G-General, if I’d known it was you who sent it! I-I would have withdrawn!”
“So. It’s my fault for not making myself known?”
“N-no, that’s not—!”
“It is my fault, isn’t that what you mean? Right now.”
Thump.
In that instant, the man felt everything before his eyes go pitch black.
As though confronting a vast darkness itself—terror beyond measure.
Thump. Thump.
An assassin more familiar with death’s stench than most, his heart thundered before that terror.
“P-please, s-spare my…life….”
Staring meaninglessly into the blackness engulfing his vision, the man begged for his life by sheer instinct.
Within a terror so acute his throat might be severed at any moment, a cold voice rang out.
“Don’t worry. I’ve no intention of taking your life.”
“……!”
“If I send only a portion again, you won’t understand my warning, will you? So this time….”
A cruel laugh pierced his ears.
But that laughter did not last long.
Slash—shriek!
Terrible agony swept over the man in an instant.
“Ahhhhh—!!”
“Deliver this message properly.”
The darkness lifted, and in the man’s eyes appeared Am Yeong Ma Gun, a demonic smile playing across his face.
“Who stands behind what you are hunting for.”
Crimson blood spattered across the white half-mask.
And within that mask, violet eyes curved in a smile of pure delight.
That visage was a demon—the very manifestation of evil incarnate.
Shriek—!
In the next moment, the man could neither hear nor see.
In the darkness where only terrible pain existed, the man desperately carved a single character into the ground.
Darkness.
That was the final warning from Am Yeong Ma Gun that the man could leave behind.
* * *
Yeon Woo and Un Hyeon returned home before daybreak.
“When the meal is ready, I’ll call for you—go and rest.”
Un Hyeon told Yeon Woo to rest, then turned to enter his room first.
“Grandfather.”
Before Un Hyeon could step onto the veranda, Yeon Woo stopped him.
“Why is death sad?”
Un Hyeon turned to look at Yeon Woo.
While all the members of the Gwan Household grieved the death of the young servant boy, Yeon Woo had only stared in confusion, shedding no tears.
The figure of a small child standing blankly among weeping people was nothing short of strange.
And so Un Hyeon understood.
This child truly did not know how to grieve death.
“Everyone else is crying, but I don’t understand. When people die, it’s all over, isn’t it? They become comfortable.”
Un Hyeon gazed at Yeon Woo with sorrowful eyes.
Un Hyeon approached Yeon Woo.
He knelt to meet the child’s gaze and gently brushed back the boy’s hair.
“Yeon Woo.”
“Yes?”
“What you say may be true—death may bring comfort. But we do not grieve for that reason.”
“Then why?”
Un Hyeon spoke slowly.
“We grieve because we cannot meet again. Because we cannot spend time together anymore. Cannot share stories, eat meals, or walk side by side.”
“…….”
“It is this severance that saddens us.”
Yeon Woo’s expression grew somber.
“So I can’t meet the servant boy anymore?”
“Of course.”
“Can’t we share the dried fruit?”
“No.”
“Can’t we even talk about our son?”
“Nothing. We can’t share anything anymore.”
Yeon Woo’s lips trembled.
They parted, then pressed shut, then parted again, wavering without finding purchase for a long moment.
Yeon Woo asked Un Hyeon.
“Grandfather… will you be sad if I die?”
Un Hyeon’s brow furrowed deeply.
His gaze, laden with profound sorrow, traced the child’s features as though reading them like pages in a book.
“Of course. Naturally I would. You are no different from my own blood. How could I not grieve?”
Beyond being the one who had saved his life, Yeon Woo had become a part of Un Hyeon himself.
If he could, he would take this child as his own granddaughter, feed her an abundance of delicacies, and dress her in beautiful garments all her life.
“I have tasted the finest delicacies under heaven, yet the meat I share with you is the sweetest. The thought that I may never share such moments with you again feels as though my heart will tear in two.”
The child’s eyes trembled delicately.
“Yeon Woo.”
Un Hyeon met the child’s gaze.
“Don’t die.”
“Ugh…”
Clear tears welled up in Yeon Woo’s round eyes.
The child’s lips quivered for a moment.
“Waaaahhh-!!”
The child’s resolve crumbled.
Only then, having grasped the pain of parting that transcends death itself, did the child break into tears.
“Waaaahhh!!”
In her former life, the child had possessed nothing of worth.
Confined in a small basement cell, enduring harsh days, she had finally found rest in death—and so had never known the anguish of parting.
Now she understood.
The severance from one held dear. How terrifying that could be.
“Waahhh!”
Un Hyeon held Yeon Woo close.
Pat, pat.
He stroked the child’s back for a long time, patting her gently as she wept until her breath came in gasps.
Upon the rooftop.
Am Yeong Ma Gun, having returned without notice, sat in lotus position with his chin resting on his hand, watching the scene unfold.
A long sigh escaped from him.
The night in which someone’s life had faded passed, and a brilliant sun rose in the sky.
Another new day had begun, bearing the weight of profound sorrow and despair buried beneath it.

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