The Time-Limited Elixir of the Ruined Clan - Chapter 95

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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 Decline of a Grand Clan — A Terminal Promise, Chapter 95

“So Father passed away because of that?”
“Yes. He said he’d finally won, that he’d feared he couldn’t come to Hang Zhou like this, and he was delighted…….”
“What did he say? What was it he wanted to tell you?”
“He asked me to live with him. To live closely together, side by side.”
Wi Ji Cheong spoke those words and gently stroked the hair of her daughter, who gazed up at her.
The girl resembled Wi Ji Cheong more than she did Dan Mok Hyeon Seong, though the shape of her earlobes and the arch of her eyebrows when she smiled reminded one of him.
“So that’s how you came to marry Mother?”
“Yes. We came to Hang Zhou like that, and we had Dan Ryeon, then we had Bi-ah…….”
Wi Ji Cheong left the rest of what she would have said unspoken and simply smiled quietly.
At first, she had refused Dan Mok Hyeon Seong’s proposal.
What right had she—with so little time left to live, with nothing at all to her name, merely dependent on the kindness of her stepbrother who had become a disciple of the Hwa San Sect—to become anyone’s bride?
And least of all when that someone was the eldest son of a prestigious clan.
— I myself have little time remaining either.
The young man had smiled with a wry expression, yet spoken with careful courtesy. It was something Wi Ji Cheong had suspected from the start.
The resignation in one’s eyes—that look which only those with little time left to live possess—was something that could not be hidden, no matter how hard one tried.
— That is precisely why I cannot in good conscience bring a healthy person into this household only to make them a widow. And yet I cannot go about town announcing that I shall soon die and asking that the betrothal gifts be stopped.
— So you propose that two people soon to die live closely together?
— I thought it a reasonable plan. And your brother would find some peace of mind as well, would he not?
That was true.
With a sickly sister hanging between life and death at every moment, how could a Daoist of the Hwa San Sect ever find clarity of mind, no matter how hard he cultivated?
Thinking it through that way, Wi Ji Cheong’s heart gradually opened to Dan Mok Hyeon Seong’s scheme.
— But what of the succession to your esteemed clan? I am likely never to bear children.
— I have a sister and a younger brother. What concern should that be? The living will see to such matters themselves.
When Dan Mok Hyeon Seong perceived that Wi Ji Cheong’s heart had inclined toward him, his expression at last cleared, and he smiled brightly.
— Ah, I thought I would lose today as well. Have you been merely eating and playing go this whole time?
— Something like that.
Yet who could have known? That the whim of fate would leave only her behind in this place.
Wi Ji Cheong brushed away the tears from Dan Ryeon’s cheeks and smiled softly.
“Even then, I kept thinking how fortunate it was that I had let him win.”

* * *

As preparations for the journey to the Gyeong Hang Un Ryeon advanced little by little, Dan Mok Hyeon Yo, upon seeing the baggage that Wi Ji Cheong had packed for Dan Mok Ryeon, nearly swooned—her face drained of color as she pressed her fingers to her forehead.
“Madam! What is this…… This is……!”
Looking at Dan Ryeon’s garments—plain and stiff to say the least—Dan Mok Hyeon Yo let out a sigh. One might call it austere and frugal in charitable terms, but she preferred not to name what she saw otherwise.
“I understand your wish for frugality, madam, but the Gyeong Hang Un Ryeon is a gathering where the brightest young talents come together. If she goes dressed so plainly…… so shabby…… won’t people say that the Dan Mok Clan has fallen to such poverty that they cannot afford decent clothes for their children?”
Wi Ji Cheong smiled with an awkward expression.
Dan Mok Hyeon Yo gazed down at the pale garments spread before her and wiped her face.
“Dan Ryeon earned a tremendous amount of money with the Clear Lotus Water. Surely we can use that to purchase some proper clothes first…….”
“How could I spend money that Dan Ryeon earned herself?”
“But that would be for Dan Ryeon’s sake!”
“That may be true, but Dan Ryeon said she wanted to use that money to raise the children. And since she’s expressed interest in developing the branch house…….”
Dan Mok Hyeon Yo had heard that story before. Dan Mok Ryeon had not hidden her intentions regarding the clan’s growth.
“But surely we cannot spend only Dan Ryeon’s money for everything! Of course we would contribute as well. And yet you mean to send her off in these pale, colorless clothes?”
“White Clothing is something like a symbol of the Dan Mok Clan, so wouldn’t it be appropriate?”
The people of the Dan Mok Clan did indeed favor White Clothing. But their White Clothing was not this kind—merely pale and devoid of any color to add to it.
What symbolized the clan’s elegance was pure white silk embroidered with silver thread, gleaming like a snow-covered plain!
“Of course it’s not appropriate! And furthermore…….”
Dan Mok Hyeon Yo pressed her fingers firmly against her forehead.
When she had worked so hard in Ha Nan Province to extend the clan’s influence, there were those who looked upon her efforts with displeasure.
People who regarded her as a villainess of the worst sort, scheming to seize the position of the eldest son and daughter of her dead brother, who were still very much alive.
And if those people saw the eldest daughter of that dead brother dressed shabbily while her own daughter was clothed in luxury, what would they say?
“The last time the children went out together, and when they went to the Geum Ga Jang, I told you that I would see they were dressed properly, didn’t I?”
She wouldn’t dream of dressing both children in such shabby clothes just to avoid comparisons.
Dan Mok Seong had barely ten years left in her childhood, and it was Dan Mok Hyeon Yo’s greatest desire to give her everything splendid and beautiful she could manage in that time.
Dan Mok Hyeon Yo pressed her brow and steeled herself before speaking.
“I’ll take care of Ryeon’s wardrobe myself.”
“You needn’t go so far…….”
“My husband’s family is well-off, so it’s no trouble. And since my father’s family is in a delicate position right now, I can manage this in the meantime.”
They had to depart in a fortnight—could she have several garments made for Ryeon by then?
And it wasn’t just Ryeon’s clothes that were a problem. What on earth was Dan Mok Hyeon U supposed to wear?
“Um, does that really matter so much?” Wi Ji Cheong asked carefully. The moment the words left her lips, Dan Mok Hyeon Yo started as if struck by a blade.
“Even if we were going to Shaolin Temple instead of Gyeong Hang Un Ryeon, dress matters! You probably think I’m vulgar, that I wear finery and collect ornaments just to show off. But the truth is, if people see you in plain clothes, they trample right over you.”
They mock you for not being able to afford proper garments. They measure your fortune by your jewelry. They assume your learning is shallow because you lack money!
“Yes, it’s a lovely sentiment from the ancient sages—that one can maintain dignity in humble dress. But why do you think those words came from ancient sages? Because reality isn’t like that! That’s why they had to say it!”
Once she’d spoken, she felt the heat fade—realizing she’d flared up far more than necessary.
Dan Mok Hyeon Yo’s face burned crimson, and she hesitated.
‘But it’s always just me.’
In the household, she alone fretted over appearances.
Her beloved brother’s wife—a poor, sickly orphan—asked for nothing but to pin a single daffodil in her ear and wore that soft smile, and it had always pierced Dan Mok Hyeon Yo to the core.
As though the woman were saying that inner substance mattered more than all the ornaments draped across one’s own body.
As though she were saying that one’s harsh, shabby inner self couldn’t be hidden even in the finest silk.
She knew it was wounded pride talking, but knowing didn’t make her heart any lighter.
“Ah…… no, that wasn’t what I meant. I simply didn’t understand such things well.”
This time Dan Mok Hyeon Yo truly held her breath as though struck by a blade.
Dan Mok Hyeon Yo herself was the one who knew best what Wi Ji Cheong’s circumstances had been—not even Dan Mok Hyeon Seong.
She was the one who had gathered and prepared everything needed for Wi Ji Cheong’s wedding ceremony.
When Wi Ji Cheong came to the Dan Mok Clan, she had truly possessed nothing.
Even her stepbrother, the one person she had claimed to have, had taken the path of a Daoist on Hwa San.
“So if such things really do matter, I thought it was right that I provide Ryeon’s clothes myself. And since I already owed the external branch leader a debt when we went to Geum Ga Jang last time……”
“Ah……”
“Could you introduce me to a skilled tailor?”
“……Of course. Why else would I have mentioned it if I hadn’t been thinking of introducing you?”
Dan Mok Hyeon Yo turned her head away stiffly, feeling an unexpected swell of emotion, and nodded.

A man slowly rose to his feet in a chamber where the stench of rotting meat mingled with the copper reek of blood and the heavy sweetness of dozens of incense sticks burning all at once.
From the man’s hand, a withered lump of something fell away with a soft plop.
……
The man’s lips were ruddy and vital, yet his face defied easy reckoning of age.
By the wavering shadows in the firelight, he might have been thirty—but those shrewd eyes suggested fifty, and yet his exposed hands, unmarked by labor, looked as delicate and fair as a pampered boy of twenty.
The man rose and kicked away the debris cluttering his feet. At the sound of it tumbling, the figures in the corridor outside held their breath so completely it was audible.
When the man opened the door, those in the hallway swiftly prostrated themselves, faces pressed flat. The corridor too reeked of death and blood and the incense meant to suppress such odors.
“Gok Ju, did you cough?” one of the prone figures ventured.
“Gok Ju, did you cough?” another echoed.
The prostrate forms, gaunt and wild-eyed with fervor, gazed up at him with expressions brimming with longing and devotion.

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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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