Surviving as the Heavenly Demon’s Concubine - Chapter 49

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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If I react, she’ll obviously find it even more amusing.

 

“You asked why I was crying?”

 

Riser pretended not to hear Mujin’s teasing words and went straight to the main point.

 

“I’ll tell you in advance that I won’t be spilling all my intimate personal details.”

 

“Do whatever you want. I’m not curious about some woman I just met’s secrets. It’s just that with the situation being what it is, we each need to hold one weakness over the other to feel at ease.”

 

Ah. So that was the reason.

 

Riser felt a bit lighter knowing that Mujin wasn’t trying to pry into her private life out of mere curiosity.

 

“….”

 

Mujin picked up a stone and played with it like a fidget toy.

 

He seemed to be deliberately showing disinterest without rushing her, so Riser could speak comfortably.

 

‘Looking at this, he’s not someone completely lacking in consideration.’

 

She’d heard him called a scoundrel so often that her expectations were low.

 

Just as Riser was forming a slightly better impression of Mujin, he threw the stone he’d been holding into the pond.

 

Splash!

 

“…I made a friend here.”

 

Looking at the ripples flowing under the gentle moonlight, her mouth opened naturally.

 

“Honestly, it was an unexpected situation. I had no intention of making friends. I planned to maintain an appropriate distance, only getting close enough to not seem strange to others. I thought the other person felt the same way.”

 

When she first met Jegal Lin, she had suggested that as fellow practitioners of non-mainstream martial arts who don’t use bladed weapons, they should help each other and get along well.

 

Those words sounded reasonable to Riser’s ears too.

 

She had even felt relieved that they wouldn’t get too close too quickly.

 

“But then…”

 

To maintain psychological distance, Jegal Lin was far too genuine and consistent in her words and actions.

 

“She’s just too sincere all by herself.”

 

When she would shout ‘Riser!’ from far away and wave her hand happily, her true feelings were more clearly visible than a puppy’s.

 

Sometimes I couldn’t understand what she was thinking, and sometimes she would do bewildering things with ideas that seemed somehow off-focus.

 

But at least her motives never once confused me.

 

“It’s not like I’m some cold-blooded person. Receiving such easily understood goodwill, I couldn’t help but grow fond of her.”

 

In the end, Riser came to acknowledge Jegal Lin as her close friend.

 

Mujin, who had been silently listening to Riser’s story for a while, frowned and tilted his head this way and that.

 

“Just from hearing the story, I don’t understand why you cried.”

 

“That’s because the problem starts from here on. I said from the beginning I had no intention of making friends, right? I wasn’t mentally prepared at all.”

 

“Why on earth do you need mental preparation to make friends?”

 

“….”

 

Riser glared at Mujin silently.

 

Even though her expression probably wasn’t clearly visible in the darkness, could he still sense her warning look?

 

Mujin shrugged his shoulders and subtly averted his gaze.

 

“Anyway… that’s how I made a friend, and I was getting along well in my own way these past few days. Then just a while ago, something happened.”

 

Riser fidgeted with her legs, showing signs of anxiety.

 

She obviously wouldn’t tell the story about being reincarnated, but from here on was truly intimate territory.

 

“Here.”

 

Mujin picked up a stone and placed it on Riser’s palm.

 

Without needing an explanation, she seemed to understand what he wanted her to do, so Riser swung her arm with all her might.

 

“Hah!”

 

The stone that left Riser’s hand shot straight out like a fastball and hit the retaining wall stones around the pond with a ‘bang!’

 

“How can you throw it that hard!”

 

Had she unconsciously infused the stone with internal energy?

 

The quite solid-looking retaining wall stone developed cracks on its surface, then split in half with a crack the next moment.

 

“S-sorry. I did it without thinking.”

 

“Really now…”

 

‘Hmm?’

 

Mujin felt a sense of déjà vu, as if something similar had happened before.

 

Before he could properly reflect on the faint memory, Riser’s story began again.

 

“She tried to tell me a secret. Isn’t that ridiculous? How long have we even known each other, yet she trusts someone that much. What does she think I might do with that secret.”

 

“Your friend seems to have a trusting personality. Isn’t it fine as long as she has good recovery ability?”

 

“Still, it’s better not to get hurt in the first place.”

 

Riser paused for a moment, watching the gently subsiding ripples, then continued.

 

“Emotional wounds leave scars too.”

 

“That’s true.”

 

Mujin nodded as if he understood.

 

‘He looks like someone who’s never been hurt in his life.’

 

It was absurd how he nodded knowingly while pretending to understand, but she let it pass, thinking he must have his own pain.

 

“When you think about it, it’s something to be grateful for. Telling me a secret means she trusts me that much. But I… strangely couldn’t bring myself to listen. So I ran away.”

 

“Hmm.”

 

Riser felt a bit relieved by Mujin’s attitude of neither affirming nor denying.

 

The fact that she had run away because she couldn’t bear the weight when her friend courageously tried to share a secret… honestly wasn’t something that would sound good.

 

“It’s not that strange.”

 

“Really?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

Mujin continued speaking while raising his gaze as if looking at distant mountains.

 

“You weren’t ready to share secrets, but if you unilaterally hear someone else’s secret, it’s burdensome. You’re grateful, but there’s no promise of reciprocation. It’s like being in debt somehow…”

 

Riser was subtly surprised. To think that Mujin had the ability to understand such delicate emotions.

 

‘They say you can know ten fathoms of water but not one fathom of a person’s heart.’

 

Who would have known that the third prince, notorious as a scoundrel, possessed such sensitive sensibility?

 

“But your friend probably didn’t intend that.”

 

“Of course not. Do you think Lin has such a calculating and manipulative personality?”

 

“So your friend’s name is Lin.”

 

Oh no. I said it without thinking.

 

“Could you pretend you didn’t hear that?”

 

“It’s fine if I heard it. I probably won’t remember anyway.”

 

This time Mujin picked up two stones, gave one to Riser, and threw the other into the pond.

 

“Watch this.”

 

Then he demonstrated a more advanced stone-throwing technique.

 

The stone Mujin threw glided along the water surface, then bounced – bounce, bounce – skipping across the water.

 

“It requires technique.”

 

‘Unbelievable. How old is he to be showing off something like this.’

 

Riser thought this and grumbled inwardly, but in reality she was rolling up her sleeves and preparing to throw a stone.

 

“Snap your wrist like this!”

 

Right. He’s telling me to use the snap.

 

Riser nodded as if she understood, then heightened her concentration and aimed at the water surface.

 

Setting aside the heavy conversation from just before and focusing her attention on the simple sensation of throwing a stone actually cleared her head.

 

“Hah!”

 

Whoosh- skip! Skip! Splash-!

 

“Kyaa! Did you see that just now?”

 

“Be quiet! Do you know what time it is?”

 

Riser, who succeeded at skipping stones on her first try, jumped up and down with joy as if she could fly.

 

While Riser herself would just get scolded for making noise while others were sleeping, Mujin, who would be in real trouble if caught here, was startled and grabbed Riser’s wrist tightly.

 

“I don’t know! The hour of the rat?”

 

But the moment he faced her cheerful voice bubbling with joy and her two cheeks flushed with the excitement of success, he was speechless.

 

“…Yeah. It’s about the hour of the rat.”

 

The moment Riser noticed that Mujin’s voice had strangely quieted and his gaze was fixed somewhere, seeming somehow unusual.

 

“By the way, what’s your name?”

 

The excitement that had risen to the top of her head gradually subsided.

 

“My… name?”

 

“Yes. Your name.”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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