Return of the God of War - Chapter 7

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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 7: A Vow, Not a Provocation
While Muk Yeojin and Muk Iyeon faced each other in the reception hall, Namgung Ryeongryeong and Pyo Yeon sat across from one another in the inner chamber of the quarters.
Namgung Ryeongryeong’s eyes narrowed as she studied the swelling on Pyo Yeon’s cheek, and she withdrew a vial of Premium Healing Medicine from her sleeve, offering it across.
Pyo Yeon waved her hands in flustered protest.
“Ah… Miss, I’m quite all right.”
“Take it.”
“…Yes.”
Pyo Yeon, who knew all too well that her mistress’s stubbornness was no ordinary thing, did not trouble herself with a second refusal.
She would accept it in the end regardless.
A silence hung between them, heavy and subdued.
Perceptive as always, Pyo Yeon quickly discerned that Namgung Ryeongryeong felt a measure of guilt toward her.
No doubt she blamed herself for the blow Pyo Yeon had received.
Nearly twenty years they had spent together, yet still she seemed a remarkable woman.
Just moments before, she had seized Bang Byeongil by the throat and dominated the entire assembly with fearsome might—yet in the next breath, she showed only boundless care and tenderness toward those she held dear.
Namgung Ryeongryeong was one who became infinitely stronger against the strong, and infinitely softer toward the weak.
How, then, could one who served her not hold her in the deepest regard?
To lighten the weighted air, Pyo Yeon let slip a subtle smile.
“You’ve changed so very much, Miss.”
She was speaking of Muk Yeojin.
At mention of her son, Namgung Ryeongryeong’s expression softened, and she exhaled a long breath.
“Indeed. The way he spoke without restraint before the Jeokrang Master earlier, and especially this afternoon surrounded by Sadocheon’s administrators—it was truly…”
“When I saw the young master today, I thought, ‘Ah, this one is truly our Miss’s child.’ That’s what struck me.”
Pyo Yeon covered her mouth with her sleeve and spoke in a playful tone.
Namgung Ryeongryeong opened her eyes slightly, a wry look crossing her face.
“When was I ever so reckless?”
At this, Pyo Yeon widened her eyes and responded with exaggerated gesture.
“Goodness! If recklessness is the measure, Miss, you surpassed it by far! I can still see it clear as day—you standing alone with a single sword in hand, smashing through the gates of Manryeongung as you stormed inside shouting, ‘Master of Sadocheon! I am Namgung Ryeongryeong, who will be your wife! Come out this instant!’ and raising absolute bedlam.”
“Cough! Cough!… Forget it. That’s an order.”
“Of course, Miss. Whose order would that be, and I’ve already forgotten it. What did I say?”
Namgung Ryeongryeong fixed Pyo Yeon with a cat-like gaze, then the two burst into laughter together.
The weight that had hung over her heart evaporated in an instant.
No wonder she held Pyo Yeon so dear.
Her spirits lifted, Namgung Ryeongryeong spoke once more.
“Pyo Yeon.”
“Yes, Miss?”
“Could you find me a sword?”
Pyo Yeon hesitated for a moment before she spoke.
“…Miss, I have a sword.”
Namgung Ryeongryeong started at this wholly unexpected answer.
“You still have it?”
“Of course. I’ve been maintaining it faithfully, visiting the smith’s forge regularly all these years.”
“I distinctly told you to discard it or sell it…”
On the day Namgung Ryeongryeong was wed to the Sadocheon Master, she had let that sword slip from her hands.
She could not shake the thought that it was the sword and her martial arts—the very tools of a Heretical Path she despised—that had led to her being sold as a bride to the Master of that accursed place.
The first command she had given to Pyo Yeon upon their meeting was to discard her sword.
“…If you’d sold it, you could have secured a fine manor house in a prime location with the proceeds.”
“Even so, every time I’ve gone to the smithy, the master has begged me to reconsider. When he offered five hundred gold coins, I’ll admit I was tempted.”
And yet, after nearly twenty years, she still possessed it.
“You’re quite something—you have the integrity of bamboo, truly.”
“That rogue of a man who puffed up my cheek said something interesting: ‘A servant follows her master’s nature.’ I suppose that settles it.”
Namgung Ryeongryeong could not help but burst into hearty laughter.
That she had entered Sadocheon through a political marriage was perhaps the gravest misfortune of her life; yet the fortune of bearing her son Yeojin and meeting Pyo Yeon seemed to more than offset that calamity.
Even as they spoke in this pleasant manner, Namgung Ryeongryeong’s expression suddenly hardened, and she opened her mouth with deliberate caution.
“I think I must send word to the clan.”
Pyo Yeon’s eyes widened in surprise at this.
“…Have you decided, Miss?”
“Yes. If the boy says he means to change, I cannot be the deadweight clinging to his tail as he rises to heaven itself.”
“You’ve thought well on this.”
A flicker of anxiety crossed Namgung Ryeongryeong’s eyes just then.
By now, countless administrators of Sadocheon had marked Yeojin in their sights.
If he were to straighten his hunched frame here and gather his strength, the checks that would come his way would far exceed the crude persecution he’d endured until now.
How could Pyo Yeon, whose mind was sharp as a blade, fail to understand that those who would suffer most in such a scenario were servants like himself?
“It will be… quite difficult, I imagine.”
Pyo Yeon, whose gaze had been fixed on Namgung Ryeongryeong, shook his head with measured calm.
“Miss… forgive me for speaking plainly, but the dragon I wish to soar to the heavens is none other than Crazy Dragon.
Namgung Ryeongryeong’s body trembled at Pyo Yeon’s unexpected answer.
The epithet of hers that the world had long forgotten.
Crazy Dragon Sword—Namgung Ryeongryeong.
“Think nothing of my concerns, miss. Spread your wings and command the skies.”
* * *
Back in the reception hall.
Muk Yeojin and Muk Iyeon stood gazing at each other in silence—a war fought without words.
Of course, it was Muk Iyeon who attacked, and Muk Yeojin who held his ground.
Drip. Drip.
Cold sweat traced down Muk Yeojin’s elegant jawline and fell onto the table.
Already a palmful of perspiration had pooled upon its surface.
Muk Iyeon was releasing her Aura, bearing down on him with crushing force.
It was the price for his impertinent words.
Through the savage Aura that constricted his entire body, Muk Iyeon was saying this:
[You think a mere five years of training lets you surpass me?]
His limbs quivered, his breath came in gasps.
Yet his eyes never wavered, meeting hers with unflinching resolve.
The message in his gaze was this:
[Yes, of course, sister.]
It was not bravado. Yet neither was it certainty.
It was will itself.
Who were the beings he would have to face in the future?
The vicious disciples of the Woneum Sect and those fiends of the Woneum Sect who had reached the Heaven Beyond Heaven realm.
And before the Woneum Sect ran rampant across the world, he must exterminate those parasites that gnawed at the Martial World itself.
To surpass all of them, he had to exceed the level of a Grand Master of Sadocheon—not in five years, but in even less time.
So this was no provocation toward her, but a vow to himself.
‘I will certainly surpass you within five years.’
The density of the Aura deepened and deepened.
By now, sensation had vanished below his neck.
‘Perhaps this is my limit.’
In that moment when he was driven to the brink—one careless touch and his consciousness would scatter like dust.
Whoosh.
“Ha!”
Muk Iyeon withdrew her Aura.
A dark smile spread across Muk Yeojin’s lips.
“I won, sister. I won.”
“…….”
Bitter as it was, Muk Iyeon could not deny it.
It had been the maximum Aura she could manifest without intent to kill.
Yet she had shown no mercy in her technique.
Even regular members of the Jeokrang Order would collapse under such an Aura.
And this small child had endured it.
‘He was certainly not this type of person before…….’
He had been so delicate, so fragile that a single flick of a finger would snap him.
How had this come to pass?
She could not fathom it.
But…….
Oddly hateful and presumptuous as he was, she found she did not dislike him.
“I suppose I need to give Byeongil a stern warning not to mouth off to you anymore.”
“You should. Otherwise, that bastard will literally die at my hands soon enough.”
“…….”
Threatening to kill his own blood brother right in front of his sister—such insolence.
What was she to make of this?
Yet contrary to her thoughts, she found her heart warming to this impertinent little creature.
“You look even more beautiful when you smile like that, sister.”
Muk Iyeon stiffened for a moment.
Without realizing it, the corners of her mouth had lifted into a smile.
“Already speaking such things without hesitation? Of this much I’m certain—in five years, the Flirtatious Playboy of all the Martial World will make his grand entrance.”
“That wouldn’t be such a bad thing, would it?”
At that point, Muk Iyeon let out a chuckle and broke into laughter.
After that, the two exchanged various remarks back and forth.
To an observer, they would have seemed like close siblings, so comfortable was their rapport.
Then, quite suddenly, an unexpected confession spilled from Muk Iyeon’s lips.
“The Punishment Hall of Mangdamjeon is not merely a place to administer discipline. Hidden there is a training chamber our father used in his youth.”
A spark of interest flashed across Muk Yeojin’s eyes.
He too was aware of the Punishment Hall’s secret.
‘I never expected such words to come from her.’
Despite everything, she had been stripped of her position as Grand Master of the Jeokrang Order because of him.
He couldn’t help but find it strange.
“Why would you reveal such a secret to me?”
Muk Iyeon let out a soft laugh.
“Your words carry thorns, or so it seems—though perhaps I’m mistaken.”
“I had no such intention, but it’s true that you’ve suffered because of me.”
“Hmm… suffered, you say? On the contrary, I feel gratitude toward you. Little brother.”
“What?”
Muk Yeojin tilted his head in confusion.
“The truth is, I never wanted to take on such a troublesome position as Grand Master. I’ve been forced to lend my name to it only because of Mother’s persistence.”
For a moment, the expression on Muk Iyeon’s face darkened.
Muk Yeojin clicked his tongue inwardly.
‘A mother bent only on satisfying her own greed through her daughter.’
She was the complete opposite of his own mother, Namgung Ryeongryeong—at the polar end of the spectrum.
Before the regression, when he had told his mother in childhood that he wished to paint instead of cultivating martial arts, she had agreed so readily.
—Yeojin, don’t worry about anything. Just live the life you desire.
He hadn’t understood then.
He had no conception of the suffering his choice would bring to his mother and those around him.
Muk Yeojin’s fists clenched tight.
‘This time, I will never allow such things.’
If anyone brought harm to those who were his, he would return suffering a hundredfold, a thousandfold.
No matter who that person was.
Shortly after, Muk Iyeon rose quietly from her seat.
“My mood has been spoiled by such talk. I should take my leave now. Would you convey my regards to Aunt for me?”
“Of course, sister.”
As Muk Iyeon reached the doorway of the reception room, she turned her head.
“I intend to leave Guangxi soon and stay for a while at Sobaeksan in Yunnan Province. Should you have need of my aid, send word to that place.”
An unexpected windfall—Muk Yeojin couldn’t suppress his inner delight.
“Are you saying I may ask for anything?”
Muk Iyeon smiled softly and left the room.
Muk Yeojin took that as affirmation.
‘With a martial master of her caliber lending her strength, crossing even formidable ridges would be as simple as walking through air.’
It seemed fortune would indeed smile upon him in this life.

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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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