Surviving as the Sacheon Dang Clan’s Servant - Chapter 23

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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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Episode 23
Dang Jung’s expression turned rigid.
“I hear you. Stop flapping your tongue.”
“That girl doesn’t know anything. Brother, have you really lost your mind? What in the world were you thinking…….”
Peng Rak, who had been muttering, clamped his mouth shut. It seemed Dang Jung, belatedly aware of my presence, had sent a Transmission of Sound to silence him.
Under the weight of Dang Jung’s angry demeanor, Peng Rak scratched his head and backed down.
“It’s not like I said anything I shouldn’t have. Ugh, fine. I understand. Don’t be angry. I’m too scared to know where I’d even live.”
“In any case, that mouth of yours will never learn. If you fell in a lake, only your lips would float to the surface.”
Dang Jung kicked at Peng Rak’s shin with a sullen face.
“Ouch! This old man’s trying to kill me!”
Peng Rak grabbed his leg and made a theatrical fuss, exaggerating his pain. Seeing him rub a spot nowhere near where he’d been kicked, it seemed he was deliberately playing around.
The two of them had returned to their easy familiarity as if they’d never drawn swords against each other.
But I couldn’t laugh along. My mind felt as though it had been struck a blow—hollow and numb.
‘Tsk. That expression of his, the one that says he knows nothing—it’s exactly like Hwa Yeon’s. No wonder my heart wavers.’
‘Even his weeping face resembles Hwa Yeon’s. It catches my attention.’
My stomach churned. My heart pounded with an ugly rhythm.
I sensed that Dang Jung was overlaying someone else onto me.
But I didn’t know that someone was his sister.
I never imagined they resembled each other so much that Peng Rak would warn against casting the memory of the dead onto the living.
How should I describe this feeling?
Betrayal? No. I’ve known Dang Jung for barely two or three months. We weren’t close enough to warrant such a word.
Disappointment? What did I expect that would make me disappointed?
On the contrary, hadn’t my life as a maidservant become easier thanks to Dang Jung? I’ve only profited—I haven’t lost anything.
Now that I know the reason for his kindness, I need only take what I need from him with shrewd calculation.
Yet knowing all this, why does my chest feel so turbulent……?
It seems I’ve come to rely on Dang Jung more than I realized.
I drew a deep breath and forced my feet to move. My heavy heels dragged across the ground.
Dang Jung, with uncanny perception, caught the change in my footsteps and turned around. He studied my face and sighed.
“So Hye. Come here.”
“……Yes.”
I hesitantly approached Dang Jung. I wanted to appear unaffected, but my heart thundered in my chest.
With one arm wrapped around my shoulders, Dang Jung stretched out his other hand. A translucent, sphere-shaped barrier enveloped the three of us.
But even at the sight of this marvel, I felt nothing. My chest was heavy, and I found it hard to breathe.
Peng Rak stroked his beard and asked.
“What are you planning to say that you’d unfold a Qi Barrier for it?”
“This girl is my granddaughter.”
“What?”
“My granddaughter.”
Dang Jung pressed at the corners of his eyes as though troubled.
“She’s the youngest daughter that Mu Hyeok brought back from outside. There are circumstances—she hasn’t been officially recognized as a direct descendant yet. Must I be so awkward as to explain this? And now So Hye’s misunderstood because of you.”
“Oh my.”
Peng Rak twisted his beard with an embarrassed expression. It was the look of a man who’d made a mistake.
“I’ve been foolish. I apologize. Young lady.”
“No, it’s fine.”
“It’s a strange thing, this blood relation. To think they could look so alike. Did you say your name was So Hye? Come visit the Peng Clan with your grandfather sometime. I’ll treat you generously as my apology. I can’t offer spirits brewed in Hebei—well, perhaps I can. But our mandu dishes are quite good.”
He ruffled my hair vigorously while muttering. It seemed he was blurting out whatever came to mind in his panic.
It hurts, sir.
Each time his large hand moved, my head swayed and I felt dizzy. My neatly arranged hair was coming loose under his strong grip, becoming disheveled.
Unable to watch any longer, Dang Jung struck Peng Rak’s wrist.
“Why are you plucking out my precious granddaughter’s hair?”
“I’m not plucking anyone’s hair…… Are you hurt? I’m sorry.”
“Ha, ha. It’s all right.”
I laughed without feeling, mechanically tidying my ruined hair. Dang Jung clicked his tongue as he drew a comb from his sleeve and handed it to me.
“Pay no mind to that fool’s words. It wasn’t like that.”
“Yes.”
I nodded as though unconcerned and forced a smile. But it seemed even my darkened expression betrayed me.
Dang Jung, softening his voice, called out to me.
“Dear one.”
When I looked up, I saw Dang Jung and Peng Rak gazing at me with kind eyes.
“Come. Let’s go back. Grandfather will tell you old stories.”
Dang Jung whispered something and patted my shoulder. I forced my heavy feet to move.
* * *
The moment Peng Rak arrived at Jeongak, he excused himself, saying he needed to take a walk through the garden to aid his digestion.
“It seems I’ve grown old. A few morsels of meat and my stomach sits heavy. I’ll go walk it off.”
At his flimsy excuse, Dang Jung didn’t even bother to respond—he simply waved him away with a dismissive hand.
He looked ready to strike Peng Rak for engineering this entire situation.
Dang Jung brought me to the Tea Room and seated me by the window where sunlight streamed in brightly. Then he retrieved his prized Tea Utensils and set them before me.
As water began to boil, the delicate fragrance of flowers drifted through the room. It was Jasmine Flower Tea.
Dang Jung poured the flower tea into a transparent Jade Teacup and spoke.
“If drinking doesn’t appeal to you, at least breathe in the scent. It should help settle your nerves a little.”
“Yes.”
I picked up the Jade Teacup slowly.
I tried to control my expression by pressing my lips together, but the rigid tension in my muscles refused to obey my will.
When I remained silent, holding the cup, Dang Jung spoke softly.
“You’re wondering who Hwa Yeon is, aren’t you?”
I nodded slightly. Dang Jung met my eyes and smiled.
“Hwa Yeon is my sister, lost long ago. She departed this world when you were still very young. It’s been well over a hundred years now.”
……
“She had talent and a spirited nature. She was a headstrong girl just like you, So Hye—her thoughts written plain across her face.”
Longing flickered in his sea-green eyes. He was seeing Hwa Yeon in me once more.
I drank the flower tea quietly. The sweetness that should have lingered tasted bitter on my tongue.
Dang Jung closed his eyes slowly, then opened them again and continued.
“But Hwa Yeon was never taught the Dang Clan Martial Arts. Her marriage betrothal to Hubei was decided while she was still in the womb. Once she married out, she would become a Married Out Outsider—she could only study the Foundation Mental Technique, nothing else.”
“Her betrothal was decided while she was still in the womb?”
“Yes. It was an important political marriage.”
Dang Jung answered calmly to my astonished question.
I’d heard the Dang Clan’s marriages were arranged purely for gain—it seemed even an unborn child could not escape becoming a sacrifice for the family’s interests.
Observing my expression, Dang Jung spoke slowly and deliberately.
“Of course, Hwa Yeon didn’t give up. Every day she chased after me, begging me to teach her Self-Study Training. But I couldn’t grant her wish. I was too foolish, too bound by the family’s rigid codes. At sixteen, she left the clan through a political marriage. And then… she died giving birth to a child.”
I drew a sharp breath and set down the teacup. Dang Jung’s voice was calm as he spoke of his dead sister, yet his face was filled with sorrow.
“Neither the child nor the mother survived. I was away on a Jianghu Journey at the time, so I learned of it far too late. I couldn’t even escort her on that final road, useless brother that I am.”
“Grandfather.”
“If she’d learned even a little martial skill, perhaps she wouldn’t have slipped away so uselessly. I still regret it. Though now, I suppose, it’s merely the lingering attachment of an old man.”
Dang Jung spoke matter-of-factly, his gaze drifting toward the window.
I wondered if it was only my imagination that made his dry eyes seem wet.
Even this elder who appeared to stand beyond worldly concerns bore scars that would never fade.
“Grandfather, I…”
“Child. Why do you make such a face?”
“I… that is… I’m sorry.”
“You have nothing to apologize for. I am the one who should apologize. This old man created this situation.”
I carefully grasped Dang Jung’s hand. His self-reproach felt foreign to me.
“At first, my eyes were drawn to you because you resembled Hwa Yeon. That’s a simple fact, and I won’t deny it. This old man…”
Dang Jung faltered, then opened his mouth again.
“…I thought, if Hwa Yeon had borne a daughter, wouldn’t she have been someone like you, So Hye?”
Dang Jung smiled bitterly and looked down. His long lashes cast a faint shadow.
“Ah… then the reason you wanted to teach me martial arts was…”
“I wanted you to live differently than Hwa Yeon did. One person withering away, their talent bound by law and code—that seemed like enough tragedy.”
I let out a small sigh.
The man before me now was neither the Poison King Dang Jung who bestowed fortuitous encounters on protagonists, nor the Grand Elder of the Sacheon Dang Clan.
In this moment, he was merely a man whose heart had been wounded by his sister’s death.
A man who, even now after decades upon decades had passed, remained trapped in the quagmire of guilt—a man who had lost someone precious.
I bit my lower lip firmly.
Though he may have taken interest in me because I resembled his younger sister, the kindness he extended to me was not rendered false by that fact.
It was a story only someone of Peng Rak’s generation would understand; he hadn’t deliberately deceived me.
Things had simply unfolded as they did.
With that thought, my heart grew lighter.
There was nothing to resent in Dang Jung. If I were honest, hadn’t I too only ever seen him as a prickly character from a novel?
We had never truly looked at each other.
When I released his hand, Dang Jung lifted his eyes. His gaze held a darkness deeper than usual.
His face betrayed no emotion, yet to my eyes, he seemed desperately, terribly lonely.
“I’m all right.”
“…….”
“I’m fine, Grandfather.”
I held Dang Jung close, as though I might never let go.

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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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