I Became My Ex-Boyfriend’s Concubine - Chapter 31

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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 31

Rang pressed his throbbing temples as he surveyed the scene before him.
As a captain of the Gold Guard responsible for the Prince’s safety, he had trained countless elite soldiers, but never had he faced a challenge quite like this.
“I’ve told you before—you grasp the reins, you don’t cling to them.”
Exhaustion had seeped unmistakably into Rang’s voice.
But Dan-bi seemed deaf to his reproach, gripping the horse’s mane as though it were a lifeline, her voice wavering with panic.
“The horse is too tall! If I fall from here, I’ll die!”
“……Am I not holding you steady?”
Rang squeezed his eyes shut.
What on earth was the Prince thinking?
Not content with keeping by his side a woman suspected of being an assassin, His Highness now insisted on bringing her to the Hunting Grounds—where the fate of the nation itself hung in the balance. And of all people, to bring this woman who didn’t know the first thing about Horsemanship.
Truth be told, Rang found the entire situation deeply suspect.
He remembered Dan-bi’s sharp, cutting movements as she pressed her blade to the Prince’s throat at Uisang Hall—the fluid, lethal grace of a highly trained assassin.
Yet here she was now, fumbling hopelessly with a simple rein.
‘Is this, too, some cunning ruse to lower the Prince’s guard?’
As Rang’s suspicion deepened, Dan-bi crouched atop the horse and shot him a sidelong glance.
“Hey. By the way, did you maybe tell him about that thing…… I mean, the Prince, did you tell him?”
“Tell him what?”
“You know, that day. When I fell into the Lake. Did you mention it to the Prince?”
Rang’s grip on the rein tightened involuntarily.
The moment he’d pulled her dripping from the Lake, her words echoed in his ears.

“If he doesn’t see me soon, I’ll just throw myself in and drown.”

Recalling it now, Rang’s chest still burned with that same anguish.
When he’d fished her from the water that day, he truly thought disaster had struck.
Fearing she might attempt to take her own life again, he’d reported the matter to His Highness with a heavier heart than ever before.
And now, what was this woman saying?
Rang stared blankly at Dan-bi as she screamed, clinging to the horse’s mane. He couldn’t believe what he’d just heard with his own ears.
“Enough.”
“Ah—yes! Why? Why are you suddenly looking at me like that?”
“Just now—what you said. Surely the words you spoke at the Lake that day were intentionally meant for me to hear?”
Rang’s voice trembled with disbelief. Dan-bi’s eyes flickered as she weighed his expression, then she shrugged with apparent unconcern.
“Who knows.”
“Are you making light of this? His Highness believes you threw yourself in of your own accord—!”
“Well, that’s the only way he’d agree to meet me, isn’t it? And clearly, it worked perfectly.”
Rang exhaled a bitter laugh.
The sincere compassion he’d felt for her, the loyalty of his heart—all of it had been weaponized in an instant. How deeply he’d worried, convinced she meant to end her life.
“To treat a human life as such a trivial tool—and to use me, a captain of the Gold Guard, to deceive His Highness no less.”
“Deceive? It’s called strategy! Besides, honestly, wouldn’t you agree it’s better than me actually dying?”
Watching her brazenly drape herself across the horse’s back gave him a headache.
Did His Highness not realize? That every bit of bait she’d dangled was calculated cunning.
“You are truly remarkable.”
“But listen. That hunting trip you mentioned earlier—is it really happening?”
Dan-bi asked carefully, gripping the mane. Rang readjusted the rein, his displeasure still plain on his face.
“His Highness does not speak carelessly. This hunt is a matter of great importance—we must secure a Sacrificial Offering for the Rain-making Ritual.”
“A Sacrificial Offering? Like, wild animals?”
“Precisely. The blood of the hunted beast appeases Heaven’s wrath—that is the essence of the ceremony.”
At Rang’s explanation, Dan-bi’s face drained of color. She shook her head in disbelief.
“Wait, why would you bring a civilian like me to a place where blood is spilling everywhere? I can’t do Horsemanship, I can’t shoot an Arrow.”
“……I confess, that puzzles me as well.”
Rang murmured softly.
Bringing someone so inept at riding to the Hunting Grounds was indeed unprecedented.
He recalled that day at Uisang Hall when she’d pressed her blade to the Prince’s throat.
If that was her true nature, then the Prince was knowingly keeping the most dangerous assassin at his back.
Something about the Prince’s actions felt terribly wrong—a question he’d asked before now circled endlessly in Rang’s mind.

“……, love.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“Truly, you remember nothing at all?”
“Pardon? What do you mean?”

Hyun had asked her then if she remembered “something”—but what that something was, he had never said.
Yet the question hooked itself into Rang’s mind like a barb and would not let go, though the answer remained unspoken.
And that was not all.
He was a man so cold-blooded that he eliminated any threat on sight, however small—even if it were a child. And yet this strange woman, this Outsider, had uttered words he seemed to understand, and he had listened in silence, finally deciding to keep her close.
Was it merely to test her?
Rang did not think so. Hyun’s eyes were not so simple.
She watched as a gaze so intently piercing would soften in an instant, and her heart would not stop its anxious thrumming.
From the start, she had struggled to understand why he insisted on bringing her to the Hunting Grounds.
The woman was clearly dangerous. To bring an unknown woman into a place where any number of variables might lie in wait—what disaster might follow?
And that she should obey him while he taught even Horsemanship to such a woman confused her entirely.
And yet, watching Dan-bi now—how she flinched at the mere breath from the horse’s nostrils—Rang could not be certain whether this trembling woman was truly that skilled assassin at all.
She was beginning to understand, perhaps, why Hyun would take such risks, why he kept testing her so relentlessly.
“That Your Highness would bring the guest to the Hunting Grounds is a royal command. I merely follow where it leads.”
“What manner of king acts so recklessly? Ah, the horse is moving! It’s moving!”
Rang cleared her mind and pulled the reins taut. The leather felt unusually heavy in her hands today.
More urgent than taming a beast that bared its teeth to its master was keeping herself from being drawn into the rhythm of this Outsider whose heart remained opaque.
Rang tightened her grip on the reins, her tangled thoughts slowly settling into focus.
Then it happened.
Whish—!
A sharp, whistling crack split the silence of the Training Grounds.
Before Rang could turn her head, a thin arrow grazed Dan-bi’s cheek and buried itself deep in a wooden post.
“Aaah!”
Dan-bi shrieked and wrapped her arms around the horse’s neck. When she raised her head in panic, she saw Hyun standing in the distance at the end of the arrow’s path.
He held a large Composite Bow in one hand, his cool eyes fixed upon her.
“What—what was that? Were you trying to kill me?”
Dan-bi’s voice trembled. Instead of answering, Hyun approached at a leisurely pace and roughly pulled the arrow from the wooden post.
“If you lose your senses while mounted, you’ll be carrion before we ever reach the Hunting Grounds.”
“So you shoot an arrow? Right past my face?”
“Did you think I missed? While you babble like a fool, someone else would have already pierced your throat.”
Hyun thrust the arrow before her nose.
Rang felt the tension thrumming between the two of them and stepped back quietly.
Hyun’s eyes raked across Dan-bi’s frightened gaze, as though waiting for some hidden instinct to burst forth from its depths.
“Dismount.”
At his curt command, Dan-bi climbed awkwardly from the horse.
Her legs gave way beneath her, and Hyun caught her stumbling shoulders roughly, steadying her. Then he forced his Composite Bow into her hands.
“Did you not boast that you would protect me? First, you’ll learn how to hunt prey that runs.”

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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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