I Became My Ex-Boyfriend’s Concubine - Chapter 26

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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 26

“To receive love from me……?”
“That’s right. That’s why I wanted to protect you.”
Hyeon gazed down at Dan-bi without wavering.
He held her steady gaze—unwavering, direct—and then suddenly let out a low, rumbling laugh.
“Hah, hah, hah! Impressive.”
The delirious laughter stopped at once.
Clang—!
A sword clattered to the floor, its sharp metallic ring echoing through the space.
Hyeon tilted Dan-bi’s chin upward with the tips of his fingers, his touch deliberate and insistent as he forced their eyes to meet. Her eyebrows flinched at the invasive contact.
His mouth twisted in satisfaction.
“First you confuse me with absurd words, and now you try to seduce me with honeyed ones. Was that your purpose from the start?”
He seized her jaw in one hand and thrust his face close—so close their noses nearly touched—and growled low in her ear.
“Fine. I’ll see your trivial mission through.”
“What do you—”
She didn’t finish.
Hyeon swallowed her lips whole. The words spilling between her teeth dissolved into his mouth.
When his tongue slowly licked her sealed lips, her breath caught and grew shallow.
He released her jaw and let his hand slide down the curve of her neck, his fingers trailing across her collarbone. The moment they touched bone, her shoulders convulsed.
Hyeon kept his eyes narrowed, watching her, then tilted his head slightly.
“Ah—wait, just a—”
Hot breath rushed through the gap between her lips. When their tongues met—hers stiff, his fluid—he swept across it with a slow, consuming motion.
The trembling of her neck beneath his palm transmitted itself relentlessly.
He gripped that slender throat with enough force that she fit entirely in his hand.
Dan-bi’s hands flew to his wrist, clawing desperately at the hand crushing her throat, but he tightened his grip with a dangerous, almost lethal pressure—as if he might twist her neck clean off.
Smack—!
A sharp blow sent his head snapping to the side. In the cold silence that followed, he let out a dry laugh.
When he slowly turned back, he found Dan-bi standing with her hand half-raised, gasping for breath.
“Ha.”
Hyeon exhaled sharply and tightened his grip on her throat.
Color drained from her face in an instant. As she choked, she instinctively seized his wrist with crushing force, but he didn’t budge.
His expression blank, he lowered his head to her ear and whispered.
“Your hands are clumsy. I was willing to help you, and this is what you do?”
“Let go—”
“To receive my love. That’s what you said your mission was. If it’s truly so, shouldn’t you be able to leave this place now? Go on—tell me.”
He pursued her gaze with relentless intensity, leaving her no escape. Even through the agony, her narrow eyes remained fixed on him, unflinching.
Her claim had merit.
When the Golden Guard’s blade had come down on Dan-bi’s neck, Hyeon vividly recalled the sensation of the entire world turning inside out.
The notion that time had reversed following Dan-bi’s death and begun anew was absurd on its face, yet he couldn’t deny what he’d already experienced.
Verification was necessary.
To confirm whether Dan-bi’s claim was true, all he need do was kill her once more and see if the world repeated.
The problem was it might not end as a simple test.
The moment time had turned back was when Dan-bi had been outside the palace. If she retained the memory of death and refused to enter the palace—if she simply fled—the entire game would change.
Hyeon calculated swiftly. Verifying the truth versus the risk of losing her forever. One gain required one sacrifice.
After a moment’s deliberation, his decision crystallized. Even if he confirmed the cause of this phenomenon, losing her—the heart of it all—would be a far greater loss.
“Cough, cough!”
The instant Hyeon released her throat, Dan-bi erupted in pained, ragged coughing.
Her reddened neck cradled in her hands, tears glistening in her eyes as she fixed him with a glare sharp as a blade.
Hyeon met that cutting animosity and smiled bitterly.
“I’ve granted you my favor. Your mission is now complete.”
“What……?”
“Go on, then. Do as you wish.”
Hyeon regarded Dan-bi with a smile laced with mockery.
He acknowledged there was some logic to her argument, but that didn’t mean he understood everything.
First and foremost, her claim of being an “Outsider” was problematic.
He gave no credence to her preposterous assertion that this world was nothing more than fiction.
Yet her insistence that her origins lay elsewhere could not be dismissed so easily.
After all, he too was the only one who remembered those forgotten moments that others could not.
Yet questions multiplied endlessly, one after another.
In Hyeon’s memory, Woo-sang’s daughter unmistakably existed. He even retained vivid recollections of meeting her directly when she was very young.
If the current Dan-bi was truly an Outsider, then when and how had she become Woo-sang’s daughter?
He’d even entertained the suspicion that Woo-sang harbored another hidden child. But after conducting an investigation through Lang, there was no trace whatsoever of Woo-sang having any other blood relations.
More than that, Dan-bi herself never denied being Woo-sang’s daughter. Yet she insisted she was an Outsider—nothing about it made sense to Hyeon.
And that wasn’t all.

“I have a Mission.”
“……A Mission?”
“Yes. A task I must complete here.”

Dan-bi explained that she had come to this place with a separate purpose. As though, apart from her identity as Woo-sang’s daughter, an entirely different self and purpose genuinely existed.
Hyeon suspected this “task” she spoke of might be connected to the “Game” she’d mentioned so casually.
Yet doubt lingered. That declaration—that she must receive his affection—amounted to nothing less than a vow to seduce him by any means necessary.
But if seduction was the goal, why reveal her hand so brazenly from the start?
He couldn’t fathom what went on in that mind of hers.
“I need time.”
Dan-bi parted her lips slowly, her expression now calmer than before.
“The Mission isn’t finished yet.”
Hyeon met that gaze steadily, returning her stare in kind.
Yes, she would never retreat so easily. Nor did he wish her to.
“Very well. I shall aid you in your Mission.”
“Aid me? What do you mean by that?”
Hyeon rose from his seat without answering her question.
Amid all his suspicions, one fact remained crystal clear: whether her words were truth or lie no longer mattered.
One way or another, she was within his grasp, ready to be wielded as he saw fit.
Better still, the situation favored him immensely. The simple fact that she was cooperating with him proved invaluable.
Dan-bi had confessed that her father Woo-sang had stolen the Imperial Seal. The likelihood that she knew its whereabouts was high.
But now the Imperial Seal was no longer a priority.
“However, I have one condition of my own.”
“A condition?”
“Did you not say so yourself?”
Hyeon turned to face Dan-bi, a faint smile playing at his lips.
“In any fair bargain, equal value must be exchanged.”
With her, he could penetrate the deepest recesses of Woo-sang—the very places he’d been watching all this time.
If he leveraged Dan-bi, he might finally achieve the complete elimination of his political rivals that he’d long envisioned.
Hyeon made his decision. He would gladly lay the trap.
“You said your intent was not to harm me, but to protect me.”
“……That’s right.”
“Then protect me going forward.”
Dan-bi’s brow furrowed in confusion. Yet Hyeon continued without hesitation.
“Eliminate every assassin who comes for me.”

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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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