Regressed by the Heavenly Demon - Chapter 18

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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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I had been defeated by the Heavenly Demon.
Geon Pyeong (3)
“What did you do?! What did you do?! Do you have any idea what humiliation I suffered?!”
Seongbaek, Jeogallin’s escort, had his face battered as she shook him by the collar.
Yet Seongbaek felt nothing of what transpired within the room.
As if an invisible wall had kept him from approaching her.
The second son of Hwanggeumjang was a master far beyond what Seongbaek had imagined.
The rumors that circulated about him in the world.
A lecherous fool who relied only on a pretty face—no cunning, no learning, no martial prowess to speak of.
All of it had been lies.
He had lived his entire life hidden behind a careful facade.
But was such a thing even possible?
Seongbaek found it almost impossible to believe.
“Answer me. What did you do?”
Jeogallin’s eyes burned with madness, her reason long since abandoned. With each shriek that tore from her throat, her hands rained blows across Seongbaek’s face and body alike.
Strike after strike, and his clothes became nothing but bloodstained rags.
“I apologize.”
“This is all because of you! The humiliation I suffered is your fault—you couldn’t read the situation, you arrived too late! A bodyguard who can’t even perform his duty properly?!”
Jeogallin raised her fist to strike again, then lowered it and steadied herself.
“Get out. Come back when I call you.”
“Yes.”
As Seongbaek limped from the guest inn’s inner chamber, Jeogallin slumped into her chair and relived the humiliation of the day.
She had been helpless.
The worst powerlessness she had ever known in her life.
Worse still, she despised herself for how she had trembled in fear before him, weeping without restraint.
Yet his every word kept returning like splinters lodged in her mind.
“I have no memory of the Soul Binding Technique. But how did you know about my Soul Binding Technique? Could it be… that I’m the one whose technique was actually broken? No, that can’t be.”
Even if it were true.
She could never tell anyone that she had attempted the Soul Binding Technique and suffered a catastrophic backlash instead.
Her memories were a complete mess.
As though she had been a plaything in Geon Aseong’s hands.
“Ahhhhh!!!”
She would repay this humiliation, no matter what it took.
Jeogallin ground her teeth, turning Geon Aseong’s name over and over in her mind.
That was when.
Seongbaek’s voice came again.
“Miss, your uncle has arrived. The family head sent him.”
But before revenge could come, the family’s censure had found Jeogallin first.
*
*
*
After Jeogallin left, I was led to a meal with Daebuyin.
Daebuyin had summoned all the Geon Aseong brothers, including myself, to the table.
Fine delicacies appeared one by one on the large table, and Geon Pyeong and I, who had arrived first, sat in awkward silence.
“I postponed this gathering while you were away.”
I answered her reproachful words calmly.
“I was occupied.”
“You mean the trip to Nanjoo?”
“Yes.”
“Hmm, what was your purpose?”
“I gave away the Baekryeongmok for nothing and returned. The Jeogalse Clan was defrauded by a woman with eyes wide open. We lost every last bit of the funds we had accumulated.”
Daebuyin maintained her distant manner, though she continued to regard me with appropriate wariness and suspicion.
But there was no need for me to expose every detail of what I had done out of concern for her judgment.
If she wanted to interrogate me, she would ask directly.
And from what I could sense.
She seemed to trust my account to some degree.
“So she came not to propose a marriage, but to commit fraud?”
“Yes. The plan was hers alone from the beginning. The Jeogalse Clan side would have known nothing about any marriage proposal.”
“Do you bear her a grudge?”
“She became curious about me after the incident with your older son, and after our conversation, it seems she wanted to strip me bare.”
Geon Pyeong couldn’t hold back and interjected.
“This bastard….”
“Quiet.”
Daebuyin shot him a sharp look.
It seemed I’d earned a measure of her displeasure because of recent events.
Once Geon Pyeong fell silent, Daebuyin continued the conversation.
“For what you’ve endured, your expression doesn’t seem nearly as bitter as it should be.”
“I’ve repaid them to some extent—enough so that the conflict between Hwanggeumjang and the Jeogalse Clan doesn’t escalate too far. I gave flesh and took bone, as they say.”
“Yet you still lost. There’s no loss worse for a merchant than losing capital. Above all, your greatest failing is that you allowed them to underestimate you, to see nothing of value in you.”
Most parents would blame the woman who had tried to toy with their son.
But Daebuyin seemed angry only at the loss she herself had suffered.
A stifled laugh—
Geon Pyeong, listening as well, let out a bitter chuckle at my failed marriage prospects.
His expression said it all: ‘See? What business does a wretch like you have being the son-in-law of the Jeogalse Clan? I always knew you’d only bring shame.’
It was then that one question from Daebuyin wiped the smug smile clean from Geon Pyeong’s face.
“Hand over the mineral business that Pyeong entrusted to you. Give it to the third son now that he’s returned from completing his inner sect training.”
“Pardon, Mother? But the third son is already managing the field management business at this estate, plus the inn operations!”
“Precisely. That’s why he should take on something greater. It will serve as a test to see what talent for commerce the third son truly possesses—one who has been devoted solely to martial training. Do you object?”
His face was plainly bristling with objections.
And for good reason.
At Hwanggeumjang, the most profitable ventures were those connected to minerals.
There was the field management business and canal trade under the master’s direct control.
And then the mines and mineral businesses run by the eldest son.
Surprisingly, Daebuyin had never involved herself directly in money-making enterprises.
Instead, she commanded the Chonggwanbu—which held the key personnel appointments throughout every organization in Hwanggeumjang—and raised capital through the metal crafting business.
With those funds, she cultivated close ties not only with high-ranking bureaucrats but also with the great and small martial clans.
Fear flickered in the eyes of Geon Pyeong, who had already endured much of Daebuyin’s disappointment because of me.
He could sense himself being gradually pushed out of the succession picture.
“I have no objections.”
When she says jump, what choice is there but to ask how high?
Geon Pyeong didn’t dare talk back to Daebuyin.
That was when Daebuyin’s gaze turned toward me.
“You seem to have no particular objections either. Didn’t you once pledge to me that you would become the next master of this establishment?”
It was as though she were deliberately pouring oil on the fire, inviting open conflict. Geon Pyeong’s eyes blazed with killing intent.
“This bastard dares—”
I showed no particular reaction to the murderous glare directed at me.
Frankly, from my perspective, this was cause for celebration.
Internal strife fanned openly like this? I should be grateful.
“Geon Hyoo managing a single mineral business venture changes nothing. I need only continue running my existing operations in my own way. Rather, I hope Geon Hyoo achieves great results.”
“Why?”
“Because it would be for Mother’s sake.”
“Ho-hoho….”
I judged it was time to stop flattering.
And that was when the third son, Geon Hyoo, finally appeared at the dining table.
“Mother, your son Geon Hyoo. I have completed my ascetic training as an inner sect disciple of the great Cheongseongpa and have returned.”
With a lean frame from which an almost heroic bearing naturally emanated, he possessed the bearing of a true man of valor.
His face was a harmonious blend of the refined, delicate features of the master Geon Wijin and the strong, bold countenance of Daebuyin.
Yet if one knew just how base and contemptible lay beneath that surface, even the sight of him would turn one’s stomach.
Among Geon Pyeong, Geon Aseong, and Geon Hyoo, Geon Hyoo was by far the most cunning and vicious in the way he tormented me.
“You must have worked hard. Sit.”
“Yes.”
After completing a bow, Geon Hyoo sat down beside me with a warm smile in his eyes.
“Senior Aseong, it’s been a long time.”
“Shouldn’t you greet the eldest brother first? Let’s observe proper decorum.”
Having taken his side for once, I saw Geon Pyeong’s expression shift subtly.
Meanwhile, Geon Hyoo responded with an utterly unbothered expression.
“Ah, you’re right. I was thoughtless. Eldest brother, I trust you’ve been well in my absence?”
“Yes, has there been any trouble at Cheongseongpa?”
Geon Pyeong always tried to carry himself as the elder brother in front of Geon Hyoo.
It was because Geon Hyoo had always manipulated him with honeyed words and exalted his status.
Geon Hyoo handled the profits while Geon Pyeong played the figurehead, often enough.
“Your mother wishes to hand over the mineral business to you. What do you think of it?”
“Ha. It’s not my place to have opinions on such matters. Shouldn’t we brothers simply do as Mother commands? That’s our duty, isn’t it?”
“No, surely you have thoughts of your own. Can you do it, or can’t you? What are your ambitions?”
Geon Pyeong pressed him with real force.
Geon Hyoo smiled serenely.
“My ambition is to repay Mother’s faith with honest results in whatever work she assigns me. I apologize to you, older brother, but I won’t dodge this responsibility.”
Geon Pyeong’s face flushed as though it might burst.
His pride had taken a thorough beating.
As the succession conflict began in earnest.
I caught the gleam in Daebuyin’s eyes—the calculating gaze of someone weighing who had more use.
A perverse witch, if there ever was one.
I clicked my tongue inwardly and let myself speak.
The stage was hot enough. Time to make my move.
“Might I offer a word?”
“What now?”
“It’s not directed at my older brother.”
Grind.
I ignored Geon Pyeong, who radiated naked inferiority, and fixed my gaze on Daebuyin.
“Go ahead.”
“Since my older brother has lost the mineral business, might I surrender my textile business to him instead?”
Everyone gasped.
Even Daebuyin’s eyes widened in genuine surprise.
“You all know that the textile business is my most profitable operation—the one that brings in the most capital each year.”
Geon Pyeong fell silent, stunned by the proposal, while Geon Hyoo’s easy composure dimmed to something quieter, more guarded.
“I don’t think you’ve finished yet.”
“No. In exchange, I would ask that you grant me full authority over the unused lands and abandoned fields within Hwanggeumjang’s holdings in Sacheon—those barren acres unsuitable for cultivation—along with all records and power of attorney over assets deemed deficit.”
Geon Hyoo turned to me with a smile.
“What would you use those for?”
“What’s it to you?”
“You seem particularly sharp with me.”
“I don’t like you.”
……
“Your older brother, at least, has the virtue of being nakedly honest. So I intend to heap my muddled affairs upon him instead, and crush that smug expression off your face. Why should I explain?”
Geon Pyeong’s eyes burned toward me with a different heat entirely.
For eyes that had held only murderous intent and hatred, they were remarkably gentle now.
Simple, even.
Geon Pyeong would believe I’d done this for his benefit—but in doing so, I’d become a decisive piece in the succession game.
From the start, the businesses Geon Pyeong and Geon Hyoo controlled dwarfed mine in scale and capital flow.
But now, having moved this way in the succession conflict,
whichever of them secured my support would gain the decisive advantage.
In other words, my actions would reshape everything that followed.
“Really, you…”
Understanding my intention, laughter flickered in Daebuyin’s pupils.
“You’re just like me.”
With that single remark, my proposal was as good as approved.

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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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