The Time-Limited Elixir of the Ruined Clan - Chapter 142

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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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A Falling Clan’s Limited Years 142

“Seong is really working hard, isn’t she?”
“You should take it easy for now. You haven’t even recovered properly, and leaving the Namgoong Clan in such a hurry…”
But if they’d lingered any longer, Wi Ji Cheong might well have collapsed first.
“I’m completely better now! I was just too nervous back then.”
“So when you get nervous, you pass out for four days straight, then?”
It wasn’t conversation one should have with a niece so much younger—born months even after one’s own daughter—yet Dan Mok Hyeon Yo let the words slip out anyway.
“Think of your mother for a moment. She couldn’t go with you, and then she hears her daughter collapsed far from home. How do you think she felt?”
“I’m sorry for causing you worry.”
“No, that’s not what I meant about worrying…”
Dan Mok Hyeon Yo stopped there, her cheeks flushing. She gave up trying to speak further. Talking with this niece rarely left her breaking even.
“…The recruitment announcement—your uncle said he’d handle writing it. He seems to enjoy helping you.”
“Maybe he’s happy because he’s being useful to you?”
“How is this helpful to me?”
When everything was orchestrated by this young niece from the shadows. At Dan Mok Hyeon Yo’s muttering, Hwa Ryun’s eyes widened.
“You’ve always wanted to revive the clan, haven’t you? This is exactly the kind of work you wanted. That’s why your uncle wants to help too…”
“…”
Dan Mok Hyeon Yo opened her mouth, then closed it again. She furrowed her brow, falling silent for a long while.
“For a child, there’s nothing you won’t say. Presuming to read an adult’s heart.”
“I’m sorry.”
Yet Dan Mok Hyeon Yo’s eyes had grown slightly misty. Hwa Ryun could only blink in surprise.
“Aunt?”
Dan Mok Hyeon Yo came to herself and hastily changed the subject.
“Yes… where did your maidservant and Bi go?”
“Bi is with uncle, and Hwa Ryun went on an errand.”
“What kind of errand?”
“There’s a toy that’s been popular in Hang Zhou lately, so I sent her to buy one.”
“You could have asked the steward to do that—he’d handle it.”
“I wanted it right away…”
Recently, Hwa Ryun had been contemplating her next moves after the Clear Lotus Water and Baek Yak Cheong.
Thanks to Third Uncle, she’d certainly obtained considerable wealth, but there was no time to rest on it.
The estate needed interior repairs and expansion; the orchards and fields she’d sold had to be restored; within the next year or two at the latest, there would be disciple recruitment; and the branch family children she’d gathered would need new clothes.
She wanted to fatten up the weakened Yoo Seong again; she wanted the Dan Mok Clan’s garden arranged with formation arrays just as the Namgoong Clan had done theirs; and for all that, she inevitably needed more money.
So this time Hwa Ryun was devising several plans, and they concerned textiles and incense.

At first she’d dreamed of mass-producing silk thread, but sericulture proved no simple matter, and when she heard that silkworm cocoons had to be boiled to extract the silk, she abandoned that dream entirely.
‘Hong-rin gave me an inner elixir I couldn’t bear to use. How could I possibly boil silkworms I’ve raised myself?’
So for now she’d set silk production aside and focused instead on incense.
When Hwa Ryun began pondering “How should I make incense?”, it was Hwa Ryun who suggested she first examine what was currently available on the market.
Then she’d rushed off to fetch some at once.
‘When I see her like this, I sometimes wonder if being cooped up in the clan makes her restless…’
While Hwa Ryun was thinking this, Dan Mok Hyeon Yo found herself turning over the fact that her niece had been so eager to get that toy, and let out a small laugh before quickly composing herself.
“As for toys, Seong has plenty of her own. Just ask her for one. If it’s something you need…”
Dan Mok Hyeon Yo had begun to say “I swore I’d walk barefoot through fire for you,” but stopped herself.
“I’ll give you whatever toys you want.”
“Then I can’t ask…”
“I’ll just buy more for Seong anyway—no, never mind. When you want a toy, just tell your aunt. What decent thing would the servants even bring back from town?”
“Yes! I understand.”
Hwa Ryun nodded with a bright smile. Just then Dan Mok Seong, finished with her training, came rushing over while wiping sweat from her flushed brow.
On her face, flushed from the exertion of hard practice, there was a rare smile, and Dan Mok Hyeon Yo’s composure melted into laughter as well.
If the child who could make her daughter—so seldom prone to smiling—laugh was her own niece…

* * *

“This… there are several shops like this?”
“How should I know?”
Baek Yi Myeong stared blankly at the money pouch Hwa Ryun held out, thinking it looked strangely familiar.
“It’s just… incense is usually something only noble families buy in quantity. Do you think I could actually purchase it if I wanted to?”
“Should I go buy it for you then?”
“No, it’s not that…”
Looking at that expressionless face with only the outer corners of the eyes raised in that manner, he had no doubt that any merchant would assume this was some young nobleman from a prominent household out for a stroll and would promptly produce their finest wares.
“Ah… understood. Shall I go buy them now?”
Hwa Ryun’s gaze turned icy.
‘Now, or shall I fetch them in the next life?’
Baek Yi Myeong realized that hastening away before those old men searching for dumplings could corner him was a service to the peace and stability of the Kangho and the Martial Arts World alike.
When he finally returned to Hang Zhou with the expensive incenses renowned in the city, Hwa Ryun lay sprawled comfortably across his bed, indulging in an afternoon nap.
He thought he’d entered without making a sound, but the moment he stepped before the bed, the boy’s eyes snapped open in an instant.
He’d harbored no ill intent whatsoever, yet his heart lurched.
“Ah, sir. Did you… cough? I mean, what you mentioned… but why suddenly all these incenses? What are they for?”
‘Surely this isn’t about paying respects to those people he buried, is it? And after that, he’s still thinking about ascending to a higher realm without falling into perdition…?’
But instead of answering his question, Hwa Ryun responded with another.
“Will you stay here?”
“Should I… leave?”
‘This is my room, but…’
What choice did he have?
This person had performed the Acupoint Puncture for him and restored the dream of internal energy. If she told him to go, he would go; if to stay, he would stay.
“You really are hopeless when it comes to reading the situation. Tsk, tsk.”
“No, I… why are you suddenly…”
“Who said anything about this attic room? I’m asking if you’ll stay in Hang Zhou.”
‘Even so, this is a decent room for the Gyeokryong Inn!’
“If we’re not staying in Hang Zhou? Oh! Sir, where… where are you going?”
Hwa Ryun said nothing, merely regarding him quietly before clicking her tongue once more.
“What am I supposed to do with you…”
“Where… where are you going? If you’re leaving, then I’ll truly… truly… truly go anywhere you say, I’m just asking out of an abundance of caution, but surely you’re not going to Blood Coral Valley…”
Crack!
Baek Yi Myeong crumpled to the floor, cradling the back of his head in both hands.
His skull felt like a walnut. Someone had just tried to crack it open and extract what was inside. And with just one clean hammer blow at that.
“Are you crying?”
“Ah… no, I’m not crying…”
“Then don’t say nonsense like that.”
Baek Yi Myeong slowly pushed himself upright after crouching there. His eyes were moist and the room spun.
“…How exactly did you strike me like that?”
“It’s a basic palm technique.”
“What kind of palm technique…”
“The name is… hmm, the Rain Lotus Palm

let’s call it.”
‘She’s just naming it on the spot like that? Why does it feel like she’s making it up right now?’
It was a magnificent palm technique that could split the crown of one’s head with just a light gesture, yet from what Hwa Ryun said, it seemed she hadn’t even given it a proper name until now.
“A palm technique like a lotus caught in the rain…? That’s quite… a dignified name…”
“Don’t bother learning it if you don’t want to.”
“No, no, I do want to learn, sir. What should I do?”
“That’s something we’ll discuss when you follow me.”
“Where should I go? Even if it’s to the ends of perdition itself, I’m confident I can make it.”
“Not Blood Coral Valley, right?”
“…Not Blood Coral Valley… correct? That’s right, isn’t it?”
Baek Yi Myeong crumpled to the floor again, cradling only the back of his head and rolling back and forth across the room before finally managing to get up.
“I said it’s not, so stop making me repeat myself.”
“But… you didn’t say anything. You just… you just beat me senseless out of nowhere…”
Hwa Ryun’s frame was clearly only half his size, yet he had no idea when or how she’d moved like a ghost to pummel him like that.
“We need to go quite far.”
“Far…”
“But we won’t be going together. If you can make it there on your own, then come.”
So the gist was that he had to trust only Hwa Ryun’s word and make his own way to that distant land.
“You don’t have to come either…….”
Hwa Ryun stopped mid-sentence and abruptly closed her mouth. Whether Baek Yi Myeong took it as half a threat or not, he quickly seized the opening.
“Y-yes, yes! I’ll go anywhere! Without you, sir, I wouldn’t know where to…….”
At that moment, the door to Baek Yi Myeong’s quarters flew open, and two elderly men—one with hair white as snow, the other dark as pitch—strode in with imposing authority.

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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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