The White Tiger Clan’s Baby Cotton Ball - Chapter 152

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 152

Mother, whose health had deteriorated at some point, suffered in illness and eventually left his side.

The thought that Soya, this child, might also leave his side like Mother filled him with sudden dread.

Despite Soya saying she was fine, he stubbornly insisted on having her see a physician.

However, the physician couldn’t find anything particularly wrong with her body.

Still unable to put his mind at ease, Irim wandered near her quarters and discovered traces of evil magic, and after tracking it down, he learned what the Imperial Palace had done to her.

The Imperial Palace had attempted to absorb her spirit core using evil magic.

Behind it all was Father, the Emperor.

Learning the truth, Irim’s mind was filled with only one thought: he had to save Soya somehow.

He sent letters several times to get help from the Vermillion Bird Family, but each time the letters disappeared along the way.

As long as he remained within the reach of Father Emperor’s influence, no matter how many more times he tried, he would fail.

This Imperial Palace was far too dangerous for her.

Having reached that conclusion, Irim persuaded Soya and together they fled outside the Imperial Palace.

However, Soya’s body had become too weak by then to flee far, and in the end she was taken away by the Emperor’s soldiers who had pursued them.

And Irim was beaten by the Emperor’s soldiers and abandoned in the desolate Northern Lands teeming with demon beasts.

Perhaps it had been impossible from the start for mere children in their early teens to escape from the Imperial Palace.

After a very long time had passed, Irim, who had survived in the desolate Northern Lands, was able to infiltrate the Imperial Palace once again.

However, sometimes tragedies too difficult to bear occur in the human world.

Such cruel and terrifying things that would shatter and destroy even the purest and cleanest of souls.

“Grrr… grr…”

When he met Soya again, her spirit core’s energy had become twisted and she had transformed into something like a demon beast.

“Soya, ya…”

“Grr… ugh…”

“It’s me, Soya. I’ve come…”

“Grrrr…”

“I came to take you… I, ugh, huk, I came to take you…”

“Grr… ugh… ah… pa…”

“…”

“It… hurts… so much…”

“…”

Before her suffering form, her soul contaminated by evil magic, Irim cried out in anguish.

As if she had been waiting for him all that long time, Soya, who had been crying out in pain, slowly met her death in Irim’s arms when they reunited.

“I was too late.”

His tears wet her body that had turned black and twisted.

“Because I was late, you died.”

Those whose souls are contaminated cannot find peace even in death.

Even after ending her life, only eternal suffering would await her.

As he lay prostrate on the floor, shedding only tears, he suddenly recalled the forbidden power of the Imperial Dragon he had seen in books in the Imperial Palace library when he was young.

If special abilities were powers manifested by awakening the spirit cores that each beast-person was born with, then divine powers were inherited through position.

For instance, like how the Family Head of Hyeonmu controlled black water with that power, separate from their special ability.

And among the Imperial Dragon’s powers was ‘time’.

‘If I could turn back time…’

Having reached that thought, Irim’s eyes deepened.

Of course, even if time were turned back, contaminated souls must be destroyed and cannot return together.

But there was just one way.

The Imperial Dragon’s orb, said to contain mysterious life force.

If he had that… her soul could also return to the past together.

After that, there was not even the slightest hesitation in his actions.

Irim killed his father who had committed atrocious acts within the Imperial Palace, and even killed the brothers who had aided him, becoming the Imperial Dragon himself.

He offered the Imperial Dragon’s orb he had thus obtained before her corpse.

[On the night when the red moon rises, the Dragon Emperor’s Bride will awaken the slumbering Death God Beast and sweep away the darkness scattered across this land, bringing peace.]

The oracle was ambiguous.

Thus, opinions were divided on what the Dragon Emperor’s Bride mentioned in the oracle referred to.

Some said it referred to the Empress, the Emperor’s wife, others said it referred to direct female descendants who inherited the blood of the Death God Beast, and still others said it referred to the woman who received the Imperial Dragon’s greatest love.

But they were all wrong.

The true ‘Dragon Emperor’s Bride’ was… the dragon’s companion who bore the Imperial Dragon’s orb and simultaneously his one and only reverse scale.

To create the Dragon Emperor’s Bride, one must offer the orb to the bride before the Shrine of the Golden Dragon.

This doesn’t simply mean handing over the orb.

Through the ritual, the orb seeps into the bride’s body to become a new spirit core, and the bride’s existing spirit core becomes golden scales that become the Imperial Dragon’s reverse scale.

His father, who didn’t know this, had pointlessly harmed only innocent people – what a foolish and vile thing he had done.

“Guardian of the Central Region among the Death God Beasts, leader of the five divine dragons, master who connects heaven and earth and rules the mortal world.”

After completing the ritual, at his call, a massive Imperial Dragon with golden scales descended.

―Young Imperial Dragon who inherited my blood.

The Imperial Dragon, seeing through Irim’s heart, warned in a solemn voice.

―Moving time touches upon the world’s taboos. There will surely be a very great price to pay.

But Irim didn’t care.

As long as he could save Soya, nothing else mattered.

“It’s fine. Whatever price I must pay.”

So he moved time.

That was his first life.

The problem was that Soya, who was reborn bearing the Imperial Dragon’s orb, awakened Suzaku in her second life.

Her spirit core, which had not yet fully matured, was startled and sealed her direct bloodline, causing Soya to lose Suzaku’s characteristics.

It was the beginning of a new tragedy.

“…Thus all your misfortune originated from me, so how can I, who committed this great sin against you, approach you.”

Recalling his first life that had now become a distant memory, Irim muttered painfully.

And if there was one more regrettable fact, it was that Irim in his second life could not remember his first time.

Irim encountered Soya again in this Imperial Palace without remembering his first life.

It was not long after he had experienced Mother’s death.

The pure white girl who approached him like a ray of light while he was immersed in sorrow – that was Soya.

* * *

The flames gradually subsided.

Saeon immediately caught and supported Soya’s small, swaying body.

“Papa, I…”

Soya, leaning against Saeon’s embrace, looked up at him and spoke in a strained voice.

“I used a lot of strength, so I feel a little dizzy.”

“It’s all over now, my baby. Let’s go back and get some good sleep.”

“Yes, Papa.”

At those words, Soya smiled brightly, then slowly closed her eyes.

The sound of the child’s steady breathing could be heard.

It was when Saeon picked up the sleeping child and began to walk.

Grab.

Someone seized his shoulder.

It was Jeok Ayun.

“Just now, that was…”

With a terribly pale complexion that looked like it might disappear at any moment, he stammered out his words.

“Just now, what I just saw…”

“Be grateful that the child didn’t hear what you said to me.”

Toward him, whose lips trembled as if he had forgotten how to finish sentences, Saeon glared with cold eyes and snapped.

“If my child had heard those words, I would have killed you on the spot. Even if I were imprisoned for that crime and never saw light again, I would have killed you without hesitation.”

Saeon’s eyes as he spoke had the look of a father protecting his child.

Jeok Ayun hesitated and searched his memory.

Just before, what did I say…

[In an instant I learned that my daughter wasn’t my blood! That pure white fur felt nothing but horrifying!]

At the belated memory, what little color remained in his already pale face completely disappeared.

“Just tell me one thing. Soya… is Soya really my daughter?”

Ayun clung to Saeon as if grasping a lifeline and asked in a desperate voice.

“Since when has that mattered? What was important to you people was only what color this child’s feathers were, wasn’t it?”

“You…! What do you know!”

Ayun’s voice cracked roughly as he questioned back.

[Horrifying? Without even knowing how that small child came to have that pure white fur. What? Horrifying?]

Ayun was certain. This man knew everything.

Whether Soya was really his daughter or not…

How that child came to have white fur…

“Please tell me. Is Soya… really my daughter? If so, then why… how is it that child…”

Unable to continue those words, Ayun trailed off and roughly bit his lower lip.

“Go ask your precious Suzaku.”

Saeon glanced at him with contemptuous eyes and blocked Soya’s face from his view with his generous sleeves as he passed by.

Seolyeo followed Saeon, glaring fiercely at Jeok Ayun before trotting after him.

A shadow fell over Jeok Ayun, who was left behind with an expression that looked ready to collapse at any moment.

“Our Young Lady awakened the Divine Beast when she was just born, when even her Spirit Core hadn’t awakened yet in those early days.”

It was the Red Fox Servant, Baek Saeon’s aide.

“The sleeping young Spirit Core was startled by a power too great to handle, and so it sealed away Suzaku’s blood to protect itself.”

“…”

Jeok Ayun stared blankly at the person before him with his mouth agape.

“I’m curious.”

The Red Fox Servant smiled meaningfully.

“Just what reason could our Young Lady have had to awaken the Divine Beast at such a young age when she could barely open her eyes?”

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