The Time-Limited Elixir of the Ruined Clan - Chapter 18

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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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The Declining Noble House’s Limited-Time Spirit Contract — Episode 18

The Samadhi True Fire

was a technique for conjuring flame from bare hands—one that only Peak Masters could barely manage. Naturally, it was beyond Jeong Young, still a fledgling bodyguard.
“No, I was joking….”
“I apologize. I haven’t yet reached such a level of mastery…….”
“Ah, no.”
“Is this really a phoenix?”
At Hwa Ryun’s question, everyone fell silent.
Until now, all the talk of phoenixes had been half-jest, half-earnest, but faced with such an impossible phenomenon, it was hard to dismiss it as mere joke.
‘A real phoenix?’
“I mean, even if it really is a phoenix…. How does a chicken suddenly become one? The species is different—they’re not the same just because they’re both birds, are they?”
Truth be told, Hwa Ryun wasn’t without his suspicions. Spiritual Energy naturally accumulated to form Spiritual Beings, and she had been feeding the bird waves of her own Spiritual Energy drawn from every pore of her body.
But the others didn’t know that. The idea that she’d made it into a phoenix had been Hwa Ryun’s joke alone.
“That said… is the terrain here particularly auspicious?”
Hwa Ryun murmured. He, too, didn’t seem to truly believe she’d somehow created a phoenix.
‘But if things keep going like this….’
Hwa Ryun swallowed dryly.
Among the various means of channeling her Spiritual Energy to those around her, she had once entertained a similar notion.
The thought: couldn’t she cultivate a Spiritual Being and extract its Inner Core?
Though she’d never imagined it reaching the point where a chicken became a phoenix.
‘This won’t work, will it?’
But when she tried to imagine it in earnest and detail—say, consuming Heuk Wol’s Inner Core—it wasn’t as simple as it sounded.
It was no small matter to slaughter something she’d raised with care and affection, feeding it day by day.
Even merely leaving was stirring up such loneliness in her heart.
‘The Spiritual Being Inner Core plan is abandoned.’
As Hwa Ryun came down the mountain, she found herself glancing back more than once, even as she’d made up her mind. The phoenix’s(?) radiance still gleamed beyond the forest canopy. Jeong Young, leading the two children ahead, was likewise forced to turn back repeatedly, swallowing her astonishment.
“Our Heuk Wol… will do well, won’t it?”
“Wherever it goes, it looks like it’ll be king, doesn’t it?”
“Still…. No, let’s hurry.”
Hwa Ryun quickened her pace, deliberately steadying the hollow feeling in her chest.
Hollow or not, they really ought to descend the mountain swiftly, as Hwa Ryun had suggested.
‘The rate my Spiritual Energy is accumulating….’
Since arriving on the mountain, her breathing had felt constrained by the buildup of Spiritual Energy, and the system had informed her that the accumulation rate had sped up considerably.

Spiritual Energy: 45
Help Text: Spiritual Energy accumulates more rapidly in places where nature breathes with life.

In her past life, she’d gone to remote mountain hermitages hoping to recover, only to cough blood, faint, and worse—and now she understood why!
‘Ugh! Go down! Go down!’
Hwa Ryun shook her sleeves, screaming silently at the status window hovering before her. Not that the numbers would budge for it.
“Hm?”
Then she stopped and shook her sleeve again to look. But the landscape beyond it didn’t change.
“Mew…….”
“Hmm?”
“Hmm.”
Beneath a half-dead tree, beneath the undergrowth, lay something like a bundle of pure white fur. Jeong Young approached cautiously first.
Hwa Ryun leaned forward slightly from behind, peering carefully.
“A cat?”
As Jeong Young gently swept aside the brush with her scabbard, a skeletal kitten emerged into view.
So small its cries came out as barely more than squeaks.
Its soiled white fur, its rounded ears drooping in frailty, it mewed thinly and lifted blue eyes to meet hers.
Jeong Young spoke softly, pity coloring her voice.
“It must have been abandoned because it was weak.”
“What am I going to do……?”
While Hwa Ryun was fretting, the kitten struggled forward on weakened legs until it drew near her hand.
“Oh, oh…….”
Startled by the sudden approach, Hwa Ryun flinched—and the kitten cried out more pitifully still. It was astounding that such a small, fragile body could muster the strength to make any sound at all.
“Ah, ow…….”
Hwa Ryun’s face crumpled as her eyes darted between Jeong Young, Hwa Ryun, and the kitten.
“Can we just leave it here?”
“……Won’t it die if we do?”
Jeong Young spoke softly, her voice heavy with pity. Hwa Ryun’s face remained troubled as she gazed down at the kitten, which had pressed itself against her feet.
“Oh, dear…….”
“Just leave it be. Something like this won’t live long even if we take it.”
But Hwa Ryun’s voice carried a coldness she’d never shown before. When Hwa Ryun looked back at him, startled, the boy reached out and gently pried her hand away from the kitten.
“You couldn’t even bear to send off a single chicken, and it brought you all the way here sniffling. What will you do if you care for this scrap of a kitten only to watch it truly perish?”
His words were blunt, yet they showed a deep understanding of her heart. And hearing them, Hwa Ryun’s face hardened even as her eyes welled with tears.
“You’re right……I suppose there’s no helping it.”
“Sister?”
Hwa Ryun’s eyebrows shot up when he saw that Hwa Ryun had heard him and was now cradling the tiny kitten carefully in her arms.
“Sister!”
“I can’t abandon it to die now just because I dread watching it die later.”
“And when that creature truly takes a turn for the worse, what then?”
“Then I’ll weep and carry on. What else?”
Hwa Ryun’s eyebrows shot up, and his lower lip jutted out.
“Do as you please. When you’re crying so hard your eyes swell like fish, I’ll just laugh at you.”
“Hwa Ryun. If you call yourself a friend, you ought to offer comfort. And don’t speak as if Ha Yang will come to harm.”
“You’ve already named her?”
Hwa Ryun began making her way carefully down the mountainside, stroking the kitten that burrowed into her sleeve.
‘The Spiritual Energy I fed her seems to be helping……’
“Goodness, really……Look, Miss Hwa Ryun! You should watch your footing, not the kitten. Sister! Sister! Watch where you’re going!”
“Miss! Miss!”
“I’m watching! I’m watching where I’m going!”

* * *

Hwa Ryun’s eyes widened as she caught snatches of conversation from the servants ahead.
“A phoenix appeared? Really? You actually saw it?”
“I saw it! Saw it with my own eyes, that’s why I’m making such a fuss! I nearly fell backwards, I swear.”
“Can you believe it—a phoenix at the Danmok Clan. Isn’t that a sign we’re destined to become the finest clan under heaven?”
“Hold on now, don’t go raising everyone’s hopes. Don’t let wild talk ruin things.”
“What, can’t I even speak? Does everything I say just ruin everything?”
“You! Remember that gambling game last time? You kept saying ‘It’s a win, it’s a win,’ and look how that turned out!”
“That was……just shut up and let it be.”
Everyone in the clan household was abuzz with talk of the phoenix’s shadow. Even Jang was caught up in it!
“Goodness, a phoenix appeared, Miss. It must be watching over you, ensuring you grow safely and without harm.”
Jang, who had laughed earlier when she saw Hwa Ryun’s clothes and sleeves covered in dirt from playing in the garden since dawn, now spoke with a knowing warmth.
“……A phoenix? Really?”
“Yes. All the clan members saw the golden feathers glimmering through the morning sun.”
“……Everyone saw it?”
Hwa Ryun opened her mouth to speak, then closed it again without a word.
When she glanced back at Jeong Young, who had returned to her post as a guard, she saw his lips pressed firmly together.
“Yes, yes. I hear the whole of Hangzhou is in an uproar about it. And……oh my! This little one…….”
Jang trailed off as she finally noticed the white kitten in Hwa Ryun’s arms, her eyes widening.
It was the baby kitten that Hwa Ryun had cleaned and fed, then put down to rest.
“Ah! Nurse, I think her parents abandoned her. I’m going to raise her.”
She worried somewhat that this kitten, like Heuk Wol, might become a Spiritual Being—but she’d been more concerned the creature would stop breathing, so she’d been quietly feeding it Spiritual Energy.
Jang, who had been silent, tilted her head.
“That…… kitten…… are you certain?”
“Hmm? Yes!”
Hwa Ryun nodded firmly. Jang cocked her head, studying the kitten, then closed her eyes and smiled.
‘A kitten, then. Surely it’s not a tiger?’
After all, it was hardly the sort of thing that would happen—a phoenix appearing from the Back Mountain at dawn and a white tiger appearing in the young mistress’s arms come morning.
“You must take good care of her. Without the young lady, she might not last long.”
Hwa Ryun nodded in agreement.

* * *

Even Jang in the kitchens of Wol Yeong Jae couldn’t stop talking about the phoenix.
She seemed to have completely forgotten about losing the chicken.
Yet even as everyone buzzed with chatter, children’s interests were always fixed on the same thing.
“Sister, sister!”
The door opened quietly, and two small children crawled toward her on their knees, trying not to draw attention from the others in the room.
“Danmok Bi, Hwa Ryun—you came?”
Danmok Bi glanced around nervously, then scrambled up onto the bed and threw her arms around her sister in a tight embrace.
“Sister, Uncle said I recited my characters so well today that he gave me Yongsu Candy

as a reward.”
“Really? Did you enjoy eating it?”
Danmok Bi nodded eagerly and pulled something from her pocket.
She unwrapped the thin cloth, and three pristine sticks of Yongsu Candy emerged—gossamer threads of melted sugar wound into neat spirals.

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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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