Heavenly Demon of the Huashan Sect - Chapter 107

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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 107
The day after the Maehwa Sword School’s examination ended.
“Sect Master! That cannot be allowed.”
“What do you mean by that?”
As always, the Unjung Pavilion where they gathered to announce the names of those who had passed the Maehwa Sword School examination was filled with heated voices going back and forth.
“Does the Sect Master intend to taint the noble position of the Maehwa Sword School with a succession competition?”
“Within the history of the Huashan Sect, there has never been such a decision.”
The elders vehemently opposed the Sect Master’s proposal to break with long tradition.
Then.
Shing—
The Sect Master drew his blade, watching those who opposed his views.
“That—that is!”
The elders gasped, their eyes fixed on the sword.
The blade that had been drawn was unusual.
The sword itself bore a pattern of crimson waves and appeared so blunt that it couldn’t cut a single blade of grass, yet it radiated an otherworldly aura.
But more important than such attributes was what the sword itself symbolized.
The faces of the elders who recognized the sword’s true nature filled with astonishment.
“That sword is……”
All eyes were unable to leave the blade.
For that legendary sword was a divine artifact that allowed the Sect Master, once and only once, to command any order.
“Are you seeking to bring this to a close?”
“Not an end, but a beginning.”
With a single word, the Sect Master swept aside their objections, and planting the Jangmun-ryeong he had drawn into the table, he declared to them:
“I shall invoke the Jangmun-ryeong.”
* * *
The Huashan Sect began to pursue change.
Many trivial things had shifted, but as expected, there were four major transformations.
First, the number of Maehwa Sword Masters was now fixed, and annual succession competitions would be held.
Second, Mangyeong Pavilion was opened to Named Disciples and Lay Disciples.
Third, Hyeon Cheong, who had taught the Second-Generation Disciples, became the Master of Wuhua Pavilion, overseeing the Third-Generation Disciples who dwelled there.
Finally, there was the construction of Maehwa Pavilion, a new hall established for the expanded number of Maehwa Sword Masters.
At first, not only the elders but most of the disciples resented the Sect Master’s decision, but as time passed and several people persuaded them, they gradually came to accept it.
Meanwhile, Cheon Hui, who had helped the Sect Master arrive at this decision, had been pestered since early morning by four visitors.
“Senior Brother!”
“You rogue!”
“I’ve already persuaded the others as you asked. So let’s spar again.”
“What’s wrong with you lot? Go on, get out of here. He’s supposed to learn medicine today.”
Troublesome.
Cheon Hui was letting their words go in one ear and out the other, ignoring them, when—
“My—my lord!”
Sim Ui Jin came rushing over, breathless.
Everyone who saw him was taken aback.
It was because Sim Ui Jin’s face, usually always smiling, had turned completely ashen.
So Hui’s brow furrowed.
“What’s wrong? Has something happened?”
“A—a letter has arrived from the capital.”
So Hui’s eyes widened.
And she snatched the scroll that Sim Ui Jin was holding.
Then she unrolled the letter with quick movements.
As So Hui read the letter, moving her eyes across it, her expression hardened.
“This… this!”
Clenching her teeth, she clutched the letter until it crumpled, then tore it to shreds.
“What is it?”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Huh?”
Everyone was taken aback by her sudden action.
In particular, Dan Mok Rin and Cheon Hyang, who had just been bickering and competing with So Hui, opened their eyes wide.
But So Hui ignored their reactions and shouted at Sim Ui Jin:
“Ui Jin! How did this happen?”
“I don’t know the details.”
Sim Ui Jin bit down on his lip.
He too had felt his heart nearly stop when he verified the letter.
“Ui Jin! Bring So Ryeong here.”
“At once!”
Sim Ui Jin answered and disappeared.
Whoosh!
The moment So Hui stepped outside the pavilion, the others inside stirred with unease.
“What could have happened?”
“I hope it’s nothing serious.”
“She ought to be all right.”
“Bah, it’s unlikely to be anything grave.”
Perhaps it was affection born of their long time together.
They worried for So Hui.
And among them, Cheon Hui—who had spent the most time in So Hui’s company—felt a different emotion altogether.
‘Finally, the crowd thins out.’
The moment they vanished, he was satisfied.
Meanwhile, So Hui slipped out of the pavilion and went directly to seek the Sect Master of the Huashan Sect, accompanied by Sim Ui Jin and the So Ryeong he had brought.
“What brings you to visit?”
Despite the abrupt call, the Sect Master received them with measured composure.
“I need an escort right away.”
An unexpected request.
Yet seeing the intensity in So Hui’s eyes, the Sect Master sensed that something grave had transpired and asked cautiously.
“May I ask the reason?”
So Hui glanced briefly around her surroundings.
As if wary of being overheard, she looked about carefully before speaking in a hushed voice.
“My father is gravely ill.”
“……!”
The composure drained from the Sect Master’s expression.
“I would be grateful if you could send people to escort us to Cheonghasung.”
At So Hui’s earnest plea, the Sect Master shut his eyes tight.
‘……The very fortune and ruin of our sect hangs on this decision.’
Would he clasp hands with the Lord of Cheonghasung?
Or would he refuse?
He now stood—or rather, the Huashan Sect stood—at a crossroads of impossible choice.
‘Ah. How difficult. How very difficult.’
An escort was no simple matter.
One misstep and the disciples he had labored so long to cultivate could be exposed to an environment where death awaited.
‘What am I to do?’
After a moment of deliberation with his eyes closed, he opened them as if his mind had settled.
“Very well. I shall attach our Maehwa Sword Masters to serve as your escort.”
So Hui released a breath she’d been holding, her hand pressing against her chest in gratitude.
“Thank you. I will never forget this kindness.”
The Sect Master nodded.
It was only natural.
Had there been no profit in it, he would never have considered providing such an escort.
“When do you intend to depart?”
“That is…….”
So Hui gestured toward Sim Ui Jin.
“We must leave as quickly as possible.”
Sim Ui Jin spoke with urgency in his tone.
The Lord of Cheonghasung was in critical condition.
How could time not be of the essence?
“I shall select the escort and send them with all haste.”
The Sect Master turned to depart hurriedly.
“Wait, please.”
So Hui caught hold of him.
“And there is one final request.”
* * *
“An escort?”
Cheon Hui, asked by the Sect Master to provide the escort, made no effort to hide his annoyance.
“When I saw who we were up against, I thought sending other Maehwa Sword Masters would’ve been enough.”
Cheon Hui recalled the first time he’d met So Hui and her group.
Assassins who’d suddenly attacked him.
Their martial prowess was individually solid enough to call first-rate, but not so overwhelming that it felt insurmountable.
‘It’s not as though the Maehwa Sword Masters are weak.’
And there was So Ryeong too.
With her and the Maehwa Sword Masters working together, it would be like gaining ten thousand soldiers.
But.
“No. I need your strength.”
The Sect Master had decided otherwise.
‘What strength do I have.’
“Is it because of Shin Ui?”
“That’s right.”
The Sect Master acknowledged it plainly.
‘If only it weren’t the Sect Master’s command.’
He wanted to refuse outright.
But what could he do.
It was an order from the Sect Master, after all.
“Sigh, understood.”
In the end, he accepted with a long breath.
“Heh heh.”
The Sect Master’s expression brightened.
“Thank you.”
“But can I take a few people with me?”
The Sect Master spoke as if he’d been waiting for that question.
“I’ll have a word with Jeok Geom and Seol Ran separately.”
His intuition was sharp.
Cheon Hui scratched his head and asked, “When should I leave?”
“The sooner the better.”
“Then I’ll go right now.”
“Right this instant?”
“You said the sooner the better, didn’t you?”
When something couldn’t be delayed, it was best to handle it quickly.
“Have everyone who’s going gather at the Mountain Gate.”
“They’re waiting there already.”
Shortly after, when Cheon Hui arrived at the Mountain Gate,
“Senior!”
Jeok Geom and Seol Ran showed up one after another, both laden with luggage.
“Have you packed everything?”
“We’ve brought it all.”
“Then that’s settled.”
Jeok Geom nodded and withdrew.
Then he noticed Seol Ran fidgeting beside him and tilted his head curiously.
“What’s wrong with you?”
“Don’t you think this outfit is strange?”
It was the first time Jeok Geom had seen Seol Ran looking so uneasy about her clothes, and he smiled faintly.
Perhaps because this was a covert operation.
Seol Ran’s appearance differed sharply from her usual self.
She’d shed her Sect Robe and donned plain clothes that could be found easily in any street market, and the sword at her side bore no Maehwa Insignia.
“Strange? You look fine in it.”
“Really?”
Seol Ran seemed slightly relieved as she spoke.
“You look good too.”
“Hah, don’t I?”
Jeok Geom puffed out his chest.
He was dressed similarly to Seol Ran.
He wore fine clothes and carried only a sword stripped of its Maehwa Insignia.
To anyone who didn’t know him, he’d look like the son of some noble house.
“But…”

Jeok Geom glanced sidelong at Cheon Hui.
“Wouldn’t ‘Master’ suit him better?”
Seol Ran nodded in agreement.
In truth, Cheon Hui hadn’t changed all that much.
He’d simply donned a black Martial Robe and fastened a black scabbard at his waist.
Yet with those eyes touched by a crimson gleam and his sharper, more defined features, he’d become magnetic.
The sort of devastating allure anyone could fall for.
“So men really are all about looks,” Jeok Geom murmured with a rueful smile.
Just as she finished that thought—
“Have you been waiting long?”
The true star of this journey arrived.
So Hui came with the same carriage they’d ridden in when she first visited the Huashan Sect.
‘Well, at least there’s a carriage.’
Cheon Hui’s expression eased slightly.
He hadn’t wanted to go in the first place; if he’d had to walk on top of that, he’d have been furious.
So Hui approached him.
“It’s been so long since I’ve seen you dressed in anything but a Sect Robe.”
“And this is the first time I’ve seen you in clothes like that.”
“Is that so?”
So Hui let out a small laugh, covering her mouth with her sleeve.
“How does it look? Does it suit me?”
She twirled once as she spoke.
Instead of the glittering robes she wore every day, the simple, single-colored garment fit her pale skin as though tailored perfectly for her.
“It suits you well.”
“Thank you.”
She smiled at Cheon Hui with her eyes,
“Ugh, why are we even going to Cheonghasung?”
Shin Ui arrived last, dressed in his usual clothes, complaining the whole way.
“You’ve come.”
“We’ve been waiting.”
So Hui and Sim Ui Jin greeted him warmly.
“Tsk—it’s not because of you lot.”
“I know.”
So Hui, who understood him better than anyone, nodded.
As the two conversed,
Cheon Hui surveyed the assembled faces, then squinted and whispered,
“These are all people I see every day.”
The group heading to Cheonghasung was made up of the usual faces who gathered in the quarters.
“…Except for one person.”
The one person Cheon Hui mentioned—
Dan Mok Rin stood at a distance, watching the assembled party at the Mountain Gate, her fingernails between her teeth.
“Senior…”
Her heart was anxious now.
It wasn’t just that Cheon Hui was leaving—the thought of him traveling with that woman who’d been flirting with him the whole time made unease surge through her.
‘I should be going with them too….’
Originally, she’d overheard that Cheon Hui was departing for Cheonghasung and had meant to follow him in secret.
But the Sect Master had stopped her.
‘Other disciples are going—why can’t I?’
She’d argued the point systematically, asking why she couldn’t go along,
‘At your current skill level, you’d only be a burden. Not only would you be no help to Cheon Hui, you’d cause him trouble, wouldn’t you?’
Faced with the Sect Master’s flawless rebuttal, she’d had to hold her tongue.
As he’d said, she was now unlearning all her old Martial Arts and starting from scratch with the Huashan Sect’s techniques.
She was clearly more likely to drag him down than to pull her own weight.
In the end, she’d had to stand aside.
“…Senior…”
Dan Mok Rin watched the party’s retreating figures with a melancholy gaze.
Then she shook her head.
‘No, that’s not it.’
She’d missed this chance, yes, but Cheon Hui was a disciple of the Huashan Sect all the same. He would return.
“And next time……”
In that instant, a smile bloomed across her somber face like a flower opening to the sun.
Before the Sect Master had left.
His words of comfort kept circling in her mind, over and over.
‘If you become a Maehwa Sword Master one day, you must remember the Gangho Journey with Cheon Hui.’
Her eyes, holding the figure of Cheon Hui grown small as a speck in the distance, gleamed with an otherworldly light.
“If I become a Maehwa Sword Master… just the two of us…….”

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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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