The Ignored Granddaughter of a Murim Family - Chapter 50

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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 50
* * *
Ui-gang’s aimless wandering came to a halt before a pond—the very place where Yeon and I once fed the carp together each day.
“What do you suppose the carp think about as they live?”
“Would mere creatures possess thoughts?”
“I don’t like that white-finned carp.”
“Why is that?”
“It steals the food from all the other fish every time.”
“Is that so?”
“Each carp has its own personality. That one with two red spots on its back is lazy—it always arrives last.”
Before I realized it, I had knelt at the water’s edge. The carp, recognizing the gesture of feeding, gathered toward my reflection in the surface.
Soon, footsteps echoed from beyond the tiled wall that encircled the garden where the pond lay. My keen senses caught their conversation despite my reluctance to listen.
“Sigh, where on earth is Palgwae Village?”
“They say it takes a month from here. The warriors of the Baek Li Family will ride horses, but us commoners will have to walk.”
“A landslide, no less—what rotten luck. Why did it have to happen in such a place, and of all people…”
“Stop your complaining. What can we do? Still, she’s blood of the Baek Li Family—we should do the minimum. Let’s make sure we have sturdy shoes for the journey.”
My hand tightened around my sword hilt. In this vast Baek Li Family Estate, there was not a single soul who truly grieved for Baek Li-yeon, not one who genuinely mourned her.
I had believed—never doubting—that a home, however flawed, was safer than wandering the streets.
But could this place truly be called a home? What possible reason justified treating that child this way?
Because she was my daughter?
I had done everything in my power to ensure I brought no shame upon the Baek Li Family, no discord. Yet this was the result I had earned?
Had any of it held meaning?
Veins stood taut across the back of my hand as I gripped the sword hilt.
“Young Master! Young Master!”
Only one person in this place called me by that title. Eon-du came rushing over and caught his breath upon seeing me kneeling before the pond.
I composed my expression and rose to my feet.
“What is it?”
“Ah! Someone has come from the Namgung Clan—they’ve found the young lady!”
“I see. Where have you received the Namgung Clan’s messenger? Let us go.”
I straightened my robes and began walking. Eon-du’s expression grew flustered—this was not the reaction he had anticipated. As he puzzled over it, he suddenly grasped the issue and spoke again.
“No, no! Young Master! The young lady is alive! She’s alive!”
I spun around sharply.
* * *
The carriage, which was supposed to reach the inn without stopping until this evening, suddenly halted in the middle of the road.
I drew back the thick cloth that covered the window and opened the inner shutter. Several riders were galloping toward us in a rush. And the person mounted on the dark chestnut horse at the front possessed the most formidable presence I had encountered thus far.
I hastily opened the carriage door.
“Uncle!”
Namgung Wan leaped from his horse in an instant, coming before me.
“You truly are safe! But what’s wrong with your eyes? Don’t tell me you’ve gone blind?”
Hmm? He hadn’t heard about my eyes?
A warrior who had been leading the group in place of Shim Bu-gwan, who remained in Palgwae Village due to Man Shin-ui’s Meditation Chamber, stepped forward.
“I greet you, So Ga-ju. The young lady’s eyes are….”
But Namgung Wan’s attention had already been entirely captured elsewhere, and he heard nothing.
“Do you see this? How many are there?”
“Hmm… Four?”
Namgung Wan and all the other warriors stared wide-eyed in astonishment.
“Haha, I’m joking. There are two, aren’t there?”
“….”
“….”
“You’re laughing?”
“Oh my! So Ga-ju!”
The warriors beside him restrained the thrashing Namgung Wan. Soon after, the true Namgung Wan grasped my shoulder and examined me this way and that.
“You, you really….”
Namgung Wan, biting his teeth hard, suddenly pulled me into a tight embrace.
“Welcome back safely.”
I could feel Namgung Wan’s hands trembling as he held me.
* * *
Namgung Wan dismounted and boarded the carriage with me. Since he had departed immediately upon receiving word of my discovery, he knew nothing of what had transpired afterward.
‘Can this man really just wander about like this? What about the clan?’
Setting aside my concerns, I explained everything I had experienced since the landslide.
“…So I spent a long time searching through Man Shin-ui’s texts to find a way out of the Royal Tomb, and that’s why my escape took so long.”
There were a few things I did not mention, but I tried to tell him only the truth as much as possible.
“And… I also saw someone there who appeared to be a warrior of the Namgung Clan.”
I offered him an object wrapped neatly in a handkerchief. As Namgung Wan received it and unfolded the handkerchief, his brow furrowed slightly.
It was a jade token soaked in blood—one I had removed from around the neck of that man, which seemed the best way to confirm his identity by searching his belongings.
“Man Shin-ui said that warrior protected me.”
Namgung Wan’s expression remained stern as he wiped his face. Then he opened the carriage window and called to a martial artist who had come with him.
“Have someone confirm whether this object belongs to Jo Chung.”
“Understood.”
After waiting for the martial artist to move away, I offered Namgung Wan the small box I had retrieved along with the jade token.
“And this is for you, sir.”
Namgung Wan opened the box he had received. Inside were two small black porcelain bottles, each the size of a finger.
“Please examine it once.”
“What is this?”
Namgung Wan turned the porcelain bottles over and over, his brow deeply furrowed.
I opened my mouth.
“It’s Purified Jade Essence Oil.”
Namgung Wan’s face went rigid. Then he looked down at me with a creaking sound.
“…Purified Jade Essence Oil, you say? This?”
“Yes.”
The Essence of Pure Clarity was a legendary elixir of incomparable potency—a single drop could enhance one’s inner strength by several decades of cultivation. It was the concentrated essence of nature’s qi, accumulated over countless centuries in a single location, and one might obtain merely a drop every few hundred years.
“Where on earth did you obtain this…! Ah, I see. You truly did come from Man Shin-ui’s Meditation Chamber. To possess two vials of something so precious—Man Shin-ui’s reputation is no mere legend.”
“It looked the most valuable, so I brought it.”
Namgung Wan gazed at his own vial with unmistakable reluctance before extending it toward me.
I spoke with deliberate clarity.
“I’ll give you one vial. I cannot, because I must give the other to my father.”
“What?”
Namgung Wan looked at me in disbelief. I met his gaze with a radiant smile. He drew a deep breath, squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them again before pressing his vial into my hand—and quickly withdrew, as though afraid of contact.
“I have no need for it.”
“Uncle, your voice trembled.”
“That’s your imagination!”
Namgung Wan’s sharp retort came with visible irritation.
“What manner of person do you take me for! I am no scoundrel who would covet something you obtained at the risk of your life!”
‘Remarkable.’
I found myself genuinely impressed by Namgung Wan’s response.
The Essence of Pure Clarity was an elixir any martial artist would stake their life to obtain.
Acquiring one decade of inner strength requires a baseline of sixty years of cultivation. The great Orthodox Sects strive to shorten this through cultivation manuals, training methods, and all manner of elixirs.
Considering that, the Essence of Pure Clarity—which could enhance one’s inner strength by several decades in a single use—was truly the most broken treasure imaginable.
If word spread that I possessed two vials, every martial artist in the realm, Baek Li Family or otherwise, would come rushing with unbridled greed.
‘To be able to renounce it.’
It could not be explained by ordinary willpower.
‘So he truly is Father’s closest companion. Can I trust him based on his character alone?’
I pressed the vial back into Namgung Wan’s hand.
“I don’t need it! You seem not to understand—this is an extraordinarily precious thing!”
“I understand it’s precious.”
“But…!”
“No matter how precious the Essence of Pure Clarity is, it cannot compare to you, Uncle.”
“What?”
“You are far more precious to me than any elixir—you never gave up on me and came searching until the very end.”

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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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