The Ignored Granddaughter of a Murim Family - Chapter 295

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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 295
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My entire body felt submerged in profound darkness.
I was so exhausted, so utterly drained. It seemed that eternal sleep would not be unwelcome.
I wanted to surrender to that slumber, yet someone kept calling out to me. It was impossible, and yet it felt as though they were gripping my tail, refusing to let me go.
After I grew irritable a few times, silence finally returned.
But then came a sensation both cold and ticklish, yet strangely warm. And it felt familiar.
The persistent tingling across the back of my hand eventually forced me to abandon sleep. And confusion seized me.
‘Where am I? What am I doing here?’
As my hazy mind grasped for memories, suddenly a torrent of recollection crashed down like a waterfall.
I understood in that instant. This situation was identical to when I first opened my eyes after my regression.
Seized by an eerie dread, I summoned every ounce of strength and forced my eyes open. Yet I could see nothing.
The light was blinding. It felt as though someone had placed the sun directly before my eyes.
“Ugh…”
The groan that escaped felt alien to my own voice—so hoarse and murky. My ears felt clogged, as though the sound reverberated from deep within my body. It was as if my eyes and ears had been sealed shut for an eternity.
After struggling thus for some time, I lost consciousness again.
The same tingling sensation on the back of my hand roused me once more. This time, my vision had partially returned.
The wooden beams of the chamber ceiling, dimly illuminated, felt familiar. And the embroidered silk patterns in deep indigo adorning the sleeping quarters—they too were familiar.
My heart lurched.
‘No. It can’t be.’
A silhouette sat backlit against the light—a human form I recognized all too well.
Gripped by dread, I confirmed the figure. And my voice emerged hollow.
“…Ryu-cheong?”
As the handsome young man lifted his head, a single tear traced down his cheek and fell onto the back of my hand—the very sensation that had awakened me.
My heart, which had been pounding with fear, finally stilled.
I opened and closed my mouth, unsure of what to say.
Even as I struggled, the tears continuing to fall on the back of my hand assured me that I was alive.
I did not indulge in foolish thoughts of lantern slides or final moments, as I had before.
I reached out with my free hand and placed it against Namgung Ryu-cheong’s cheek.
“Ryu-cheong, don’t cry.”
My words seemed only to provoke him further—tears streamed down Namgung Ryu-cheong’s face even more profusely.
I furrowed my brow slightly and spoke again.
“It’s all over now. Everything is fine.”
Namgung Ryu-cheong, his face now completely contorted, buried it against my hand and wept.
And I too…
“Ugh… ugh…”
At some point, I had begun to cry.
* * *
The Demonic Cult members arrived first at the Gorge where the Heavenly Demon Grand Vault lay.
From beneath the Gorge as the mist dispersed, a deafening roar continued to reverberate, its source unknowable.
Even with the mist cleared, the gorge’s depths remained invisible. For anyone lacking mastery, leaping down would be no different from suicide.
The Demonic Cult members clung to the cliff face, descending the gorge with deliberate slowness.
As the cultists hung from the cliffs like a pack of dogs, the Murim Alliance’s forces arrived on the opposite side of the gorge.
From that moment onward, a hellscape unfolded.
As if anticipating such circumstances, the Murim Alliance began unleashing volleys of prepared arrows across the opposite gorge.
In such dense forest, arrows were nothing but a burden to carry, so the Demonic Cult members had long since abandoned their bows.
Moreover, since the majority already clung to the cliff face, they could only flail helplessly against the incoming arrows, their feet slipping or their bodies pierced by shafts as they plummeted with agonized screams.
Yet due to the forest’s inhospitable terrain for transporting supplies, the arrows ran out before the cultists did, and more than half of the Demonic Cult members still survived.
The Murim Alliance descended into the gorge to finish them off. It was a grave miscalculation.
The gorge’s depths teemed with grotesque beings of unknown origin.
They were slaughtering the Demonic Cult members who had descended first.
Each possessed strength rivaling eight Demonic Generals, their bodies impervious to blade strikes and refusing to perish regardless of the wounds inflicted upon them.
They killed indiscriminately—Demonic Cult members and Murim Alliance warriors alike.
These grotesque beings were the stone statues I had witnessed within the Heavenly Demon Grand Vault. They were the annihilation force the Heavenly Demon had created to slaughter the Jianghu’s inhabitants once the Heavenly Mechanism no longer restrained them.
Then, abruptly, those creatures’ movements ceased.
Yet the Demonic Cult members who had already entered the gorge first suffered catastrophic losses.
Half of the Demonic Generals lay dead or mortally wounded, while the survivors had either fled or vanished from sight.
Blood and corpses surrounded us on all sides. The groans of the wounded and dying echoed ceaselessly.
At this rate, the Murim Alliance’s long-desired annihilation of the Demonic Cult lay within reach.
Then the Murim Alliance targeted the Heavenly Demon Grand Vault before the Demonic Cult members.
As I listened to the explanation, I marveled.
“Impressive, truly impressive. Would they even desire such a thing in that situation? Well, I harbored no expectations anyway.”
Namgung Ryu-cheong paused briefly before continuing.
“Among the Murim Alliance forces, the Baek Li Family Head and the Baek Geom Dan were the first to charge into the Heavenly Demon Grand Vault.”
“…Of course the Heavenly Demon Grand Vault was paramount. They couldn’t allow the Demonic Cult to enter it, could they?”
My grandfather led the Baek Geom Dan in their charge, followed by Taego Jinperson and the other representatives of the Orthodox Path sects entering the vault.
‘Grandfather entered first, yet Taego Jinperson arrived at the altar before him?’
The Heavenly Demon Grand Vault’s interior was a labyrinth, so it was plausible. For me, it was actually a blessing—I could avoid encountering my grandfather.
Whenever I recalled my grandfather, another person naturally came to mind.
I asked carefully.
“Where is my father?”
Throughout this lengthy account, my father had not been mentioned once.
For days, whenever I opened my eyes, only Namgung Ryu-cheong sat beside me.
‘Must I not return to the Namgung Clan?’
In any case, the moment my father learned I had awakened, I expected him to rush to my side—yet I had not seen him even once.
“Baek Li Dae-hyup….”
Namgung Ryu-cheong’s words trailed off.
My eyes widened.
What had happened to my father? Could it be… could it truly be?
Namgung Ryu-cheong spoke in a slightly subdued voice.
“You’ve been quite busy lately.”
“Are you joking? Father couldn’t stay by my side because he was busy?”
“That’s right. I did send word that you had awakened, but….”
“That’s a lie.”
Namgung Ryu-cheong’s brow furrowed.
“Where is Father?”
“Why would I lie to you? He’s resting. He’ll come if you wait.”
Just then, hurried footsteps echoed through the corridor, and the door burst open.
“….”
As the saying goes, speak of the tiger and it appears—it was Father.
I was startled once by his appearance, and shocked a second time by what I perceived through my golden eyes.
“Father! Your inner energy…!”
Father rushed forward and pulled me into a tight embrace.
I heard a sigh from beside us but ignored it, returning his embrace.
The hair brushing against my fingertips was white.
“Why has your hair become like this? And your inner energy—why has it become like this!”
I felt as though I might faint.
Father’s inner energy had diminished to barely thirty percent of its original strength.
Father gently stroked my hair.
‘Could this be why he hasn’t appeared before me all this time!’
His condition was truly shocking enough to make one lose consciousness.
Father had me lean my back against a cushion that Namgung Ryu-cheong had set up.
Father took my hand and opened his mouth.
“Yeon.”
“Yes.”
“Do you know that you nearly died?”
I wanted to fidget with my hands, but Father held them fast, preventing any movement.
Of course, the memory was vivid. My body couldn’t withstand the strain after absorbing the Heavenly Demon’s power.
Yet strangely, now I felt utterly drained. I couldn’t sense any trace of the Heavenly Demon’s power.
But rather than that, I wanted to discuss Father’s condition. Suppressing the urge to change the subject, I listened to his explanation.
“When I arrived, your vital essence was nearly depleted—you were on the very brink of death.”
“What? Me?”
“Yes.”
Vital essence accumulated in the dantian becomes inner energy, and the vital essence a person inherently possesses is called innate vital essence.
It is what sustains life. And when this innate vital essence is completely consumed, a person dies.
One might think that infusing vital essence into a dying person would revive them, but….
Infusing vital essence into someone on the verge of death is like pouring water into a bottomless vessel.
‘But wait—I wasn’t dying because my power and vital essence were overflowing, was I?’
I was dying because my vital essence was depleted?
Father continued his explanation.
“That is why I transferred all my inner energy to you.”
“Father!”
“You were barely clinging to life, and I nearly perished as well, but fortunately Namgung Ryu-cheong came to my aid and we both survived.”
Father glanced at Namgung Ryu-cheong for a moment before turning back to me and continuing.
“After that, the inner energy poison no longer existed.”
“….”
Father calmly continued his explanation in response to my silence.
“My inner energy now accumulates far more rapidly than before. Thanks to the enlightenment I gained at that moment, my realm has also elevated. Inner energy can be rebuilt. That is why I entered seclusion for cultivation and could not remain by your side. I feared you would be too shocked, and the Physician said you needed absolute rest.”
I let those words go in one ear and out the other, opening my mouth in a daze.
“Back then….”
“Back then?”
“I asked Cheon-ma about the method to cure Father’s poison.”
Father nodded as if he understood.
“You mean when you met Cheon-ma at the Inn? At that time, didn’t Cheon-ma say there was no cure?”
“It was actually a lie.”
“A lie?”
“Yes. Cheon-ma said that if I died, Father could detoxify himself.”
Father’s expression hardened like stone.
Cheon-ma had not lied.
“If you die, that is all.”
“Without you, no matter how I interfere, Baek Li-ui-gang will eventually detoxify himself and block my path.”
“There has never been another successful detoxification.”
“If you die, Baek Li-ui-gang will be free.”
Cheon-ma’s words did not mean Father repeatedly consumed his inner energy to save my life through detoxification.
It meant consuming inner energy—even the innate inner energy—until the very brink of death.
That was suicide.
And only those with no lingering attachment to life can throw away their existence.
While I was alive, Father could not bring himself to end his life, so he could not fully consume his inner energy and thus could not detoxify. But after I died, he no longer had any attachment to life, so he easily consumed even his innate inner energy.
A poison that could only be cured by committing suicide. How utterly vicious a poison was this?
I was Father’s reason to live.

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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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