The Snake, the Flower, and the Tiger - Chapter 15

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

Episode 15

“Looks like you ran into some bandits on the way here, Hee-seo.”
Kim Je-eon spoke to her from where he leaned against the Entrance Stairs. Hee-seo, too drained to answer, merely fixed him with a hard stare.
Right—if she thought about it, that was the reason. If it weren’t for those ears on that body.
A cutting remark tumbled out of her before she could help it.
“Yeah. You’ve got money, so maybe pay attention to security. The road was a mess. Some creep like you was lurking around, so I had to rough him up and got delayed.”
“My, my. So there was someone like me? I’m not really the type to have a doppelgänger running around. Next time, come with me. You won’t have any trouble then.”
“You’re the most dangerous thing here. Where’s the confidence coming from?”
“That hurts, Hee-seo. It really does.”
Kim Je-eon slowly pushed himself upright. His expression wasn’t just words—it genuinely looked hurt. The kind of face that would have had her taking his side instantly if she’d only seen it on a screen without context.
‘Nauseating.’
She wished those ears had landed on anyone else. Hee-seo shook her head slowly.
Mixing ears and words would only confuse herself. As she turned to pass him by, she stopped short. Her eyes fell on a pair of men’s shoes sitting on the stairs.
“They’ll be too big for you, but think of them as slippers. Just wear them while you go up to your room. It’s cold to walk barefoot. Even for just a moment.”
Kim Je-eon himself was barefoot as he said this.
Hee-seo fell silent for a moment and looked down at her own feet. She hadn’t noticed while storming in angry, but both were in terrible shape. Now, belatedly, her soles stung as if they’d been pricked by something.
“……And you—treating a body that isn’t even yours that way? You’re going to have to give it back to its owner someday.”
She considered putting the shoes back on that she’d been carrying, but like the Dress with its torn side, the shoes were ruined too. Without a second thought, Hee-seo stepped past Je-eon’s shoes and climbed the stairs.
As if he’d expected it all along, Kim Je-eon picked up his own shoes and followed her. What he said next grated on her nerves.
“Your skin’s showing, Hee-seo.”
“I know.”
“Hmm, trying to seduce me, are you?”
At the murmur—almost to himself—Hee-seo, who’d been climbing several steps ahead, stopped. She turned back and looked down at Je-eon.
It felt strange to look down at a man she’d always had to look up at, but she had no time to savor it.
“If you can be seduced by exposed skin, then I’ll give you a real show. All of it. You want to leave that body then?”
Hee-seo meant every word. She’d feel no shame in front of those ears, not at her ribs or even completely naked. She’d endured as much since the first night.
She had every intention of driving out those ears attached to Kim Je-eon, no matter what method it took.
“Lee Hee-seo.”
His dark, deep eyes met hers. Hee-seo stood with the building at her back; Je-eon faced her directly. As silence stretched between them, clouds that had half-obscured the sky drifted away on the wind. Moonlight breaking through the gaps illuminated Je-eon’s face.
A face bearing no sin, no trace of guilt whatsoever.
Hee-seo was suddenly seized by an inexplicable sense of culpability. Her chest stung like the pricked soles of her feet—as if she were committing some terrible wrong against Je-eon for regarding him with such innocence in his gaze.
“……Look at you spouting nonsense to an ear.”
Exhaustion, plus her encounter with Choi Jin-wook—that was why. Hee-seo turned away, muttering to herself.
And in that instant, she froze completely, her eyes wide with disbelief.
“What……is that.”
Before such a massive presence, Hee-seo’s breath caught with terror. Her gasp—sharp and involuntary—was loud enough to hear in her own ears.
Yet she couldn’t run, couldn’t scream. She was rooted to the spot, her eyes wide open, forced to witness it.
Simultaneously, a weight of oppression she dared not defy bore down on her. Her every breath carried undisguised fear. With trembling hands, Hee-seo reached toward her waist, instinctively searching for the Sambuljeon, but the Dress had no pockets—she couldn’t have brought the fan.
“Ha, ha……huh……”
As Hee-seo remained paralyzed by helpless terror, it fully revealed itself above the Manor roof.
In the darkness where moonlight had vanished, a crimson haze moved with it. In Hee-seo’s eyes, the dark-red colossal serpent slowly slithered along the roof, flicking its long tongue. Its vertical pupils blinked in the black depths as it moved.
The serpent, having slid across with eyes like slits, draped half its body across the Balcony of this level. Then, as if hunting prey, it turned its gaze upon Hee-seo.
‘What……the hell is this.’
A primal terror unlike anything she’d felt facing any of those other ears gripped her.
Those eyes—deep and dark as an abyss—fixed directly on Hee-seo. When their gazes met, she felt an uncanny sense of déjà vu.
But Hee-seo ignored that familiarity and bit her lip hard. Blood spilled from where her sharp teeth had torn the flesh; her mouth filled with it instantly.
Remarkably, at that moment, the serpent reared its head as if it had caught the scent of blood. Its maw stretched open as if to swallow Hee-seo whole. The inside of that mouth was grotesquely, hideously bizarre.
Dozens, hundreds of fang-like teeth stretched down into the serpent’s deep throat.
Hee-seo moved her blood-wet tongue to avoid being mesmerized by what lay before her eyes. With her tongue, she traced a character in her mind inside her lip—념—completing it swiftly into a single word.
‘Please, let it work……!’
The effect of念—written in Hee-seo’s blood—had always been formidable, but she’d never faced an ear in such grotesque form before.
Hee-seo raised her right hand to shoulder height in the form of the Abhaya Mudra, pushed it forward, and extended her opposite hand with only thumb and middle finger spread, pointing downward.
As Hee-seo’s Hand Seal took shape, the serpent descended upon her with a vicious cry, jaws gaping wide.
The crimson Poison Aura that poured from the serpent dulled her every sensation as if numbing her nerves.
Screech!
‘……Kim Je-eon!’
With the forked tongue inches from her face, Hee-seo felt the urge to bolt coursing through her veins.
But if she moved, Kim Je-eon—standing behind her all this time—would be swallowed whole. She forced down the desperate desire to flee and bit her torn lip until blood came.
Yet despite her resolve, the grotesque serpent engulfed her in a single, terrible gulp.

***

“Hah, hah, hah…ugh, Kim Je-eon, get away!”
Thrashing, Hee-seo jolted upright. She’d thrown so much force into it that she tumbled across the floor as she rose.
Thud—a dull crack echoed. Though she’d hit the ground hard, she kept flailing, her head spinning as she shook it clear.
“Run, hurry. Run…away?”
What? How—? Hee-seo blinked, her expression utterly bewildered.
This place was unmistakably familiar: the bedroom she’d occupied for days now, or more precisely, the floor beneath her bed. She scrambled to her feet and examined herself.
‘The snake swallowed me, didn’t it? What…?’
The serpent’s countless fangs remained vivid in her mind’s eye, yet her body bore not a single scratch. It made no sense.
She’d felt the poison aura pouring from the snake just moments ago—sharp and undeniable—yet somehow she’d awakened in her bed.
Hee-seo rushed to check her feet. When she peeled away the adhesive plasters stuck all over them, the puncture wounds and scraped skin remained exactly as they’d been.
But how could this…?
“Quite the sleep-talker, aren’t you.”
At the sound of that voice, Hee-seo immediately grabbed the lamp from the nightstand and leveled it at the source. The man sitting at the foot of her bed scowled.
Hee-seo swallowed her fright and drew a steadying breath. At least it wasn’t the snake, which brought some relief, but discovering a strange man in her room was hardly a comfort.
“Who are you? What is this? Are you staff?”
“Maybe lower that first and ask the person who’s been nursing you this whole time.”
“What?”
“Je-eon asked me to look after you. Said you collapsed all of a sudden. You don’t look frail enough to be anemic, though.”
The man gestured with his eyes toward the fever reducer, painkiller, and thermometer arrayed on the vanity.
Yet even with Je-eon’s name invoked, Hee-seo’s guard remained up. She’d thrown herself between that enormous serpent and Je-eon’s body, but that didn’t make him someone she could trust either.

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