The Youngest Son of the Nanyang Jin Family - Chapter 277

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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 Youngest Son of the Jin Family of Luoyang – Chapter 277

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I had no idea how long I had been running.
Despite the sun setting and rising countless times, my feet never ceased their frantic pace—driven solely by the desperate will to survive.
My body grew increasingly rigid, and the world before my eyes had long since blurred into indistinct shapes.
My mind spun relentlessly, my limbs trembled, and I felt sensation draining from my fingertips.
The blood poison had already spread throughout my entire body, and my condition deteriorated with alarming speed, making Chwiayeok’s desperation mount with each passing moment.
I had no mental capacity to spare on anything else.
With agonizing effort, I forced one foot before the other, and whenever I stumbled and nearly collapsed, I wrung out every last ounce of strength to pull myself upright again.
Only one thought consumed my mind.
I had to live.
The desperate yearning not to end my life so pathetically, so meaninglessly.
That desire alone propelled my legs forward.
After pushing forward for what felt like an eternity, gasping for breath in ragged heaves, I finally arrived at my destination—Anyang.
At last, I had reached the city.
“Hah… hah…”
Sweat poured down my face, and my breath came in harsh, ragged gasps that tore at my throat.
My appearance was so wretched from the ordeal that passersby recoiled with disgust, widening their distance from me.
But their expressions meant nothing to me.
I staggered forward, my steps unsteady.
“I have to live… I must live…”
Each step toward my destination felt impossibly heavy, yet I gritted my teeth and pressed on until I reached a small estate.
“Hah… hah…”
I burst through the firmly closed gate and entered, immediately feeling the eyes of those inside fixate upon me.
“…Antidote… I need the antidote…”
“What is this? I thought you were dead since you never showed up.”
“Isn’t this basically a corpse?”
Several men in the courtyard regarded my approach with sneering contempt.
Then one of them produced a small medicinal pellet from his robes and held it up. My pupils dilated desperately as I lunged forward, reaching out with trembling hands.
But as always, my fingers grasped only empty air.
“Heh. You have to report first before you can receive it, you fool.”
“Cough… cough! Hurry up!”
“Tell us whether new goods have arrived at the warehouse, what movements the Jin Family of Luoyang has made—things like that.”
At their words, I clenched my teeth.
A report? How could I possibly give them one?
I had been caught after losing myself to gambling and women, and only released four days later—how could I explain that now?
Moreover, if I revealed even a single word of the warning Jin Cheon-u had given me to these people, the Dan Li Family would mobilize all their forces to kill me.
“…Hurry! Cough!”
Thud-!
“How dare you lay hands on it, you thieving wretch!”
I lashed out with a vicious kick at Chwiayeok, who was attempting to snatch the antidote from me once more. As he tumbled helplessly to the ground in an ungainly heap like a frog, laughter erupted from all corners of the hall.
“Hahaha- Look at that.”
“A posture befitting a thief.”
“Come now, try begging from that position. Say ‘Please, I beg you, spare my life.'”
The hall was filled with mockery and ridicule.
Though Chwiayeok had consumed the Blood Mountain Poison and resolved everything the Dan Li Family desired, the manner in which they treated him was utterly contemptible.
Eyes that gazed upon him as one would regard filth and refuse.
Yes, to warriors, a thief was precisely such a creature.
Chwiayeok slowly steadied his breathing and rose to his feet.
The surging rage within him would not subside.
Though he endured mockery and contempt regularly, there was a stark difference between suffering such treatment when death loomed near and when it did not.
Yes, it was all or nothing now.
Death by one means or another—it made no difference.
He grasped the worn dagger at his waist with great effort.
Soon after, he clenched his teeth and stilled his presence.
“…!?”
Whoosh-!
“Gack!”
I drove the dagger into one man’s throat with all my strength, and seized the antidote he carried.
The Dan Li Family’s soldiers, startled by the sudden assault, began drawing their blades in haste, but the antidote took precedence over all else.
Gulp!
As I poured it into my mouth in one swift motion.
A blade came flying.
“You mad bastard!”
Shing-!
The incoming sword was terrifyingly swift.
Facing it head-on, I could never withstand it.
My leaden feet barely obeyed as I stumbled backward.
Slash!
The blade tore through my collar and bit into flesh.
The cold metal’s touch was sharp enough to raise goosebumps, yet it only further ignited my survival instinct.
My presence vanished once more.
Whoosh!
“Choke!”
Someone’s throat was pierced, and the men who reacted to the sound turned their gaze, but I had already vanished from sight, my presence dissolving back into the darkness.
“You… you mad fool! Do you think you’ll escape after killing us?!”
“That antidote was the only one! If the Family Head learns of this, you’ll never… cough!”
Go ahead and prattle on.
Chwiayeok, concealed in some unknowable place, let out a bitter laugh.
If the Jin Family’s involvement were exposed, the Dan Li Family would surely try to kill him, and conversely, failing to obtain the antidote would be just as fatal.
Then he might as well struggle to the bitter end.
No—he would drive this worn dagger he held deep into the very heart of the Dan Li Family.
So that they would know Chwiayeok had existed in this world.
Whoooosh!

* * *

The moment I entered Anyang, I sensed the atmosphere stirring with unease.
The people gathered in the marketplace wore troubled expressions, whispering amongst themselves, and several of them were not infrequently retching.
From this alone, I could discern that something grave had occurred.
“Good heavens, how many are dead?”
“Damn it… the stench of corpses seems to reach even here.”
I moved slowly, taking in their scattered words. Then my eyes fell upon a small manor, and despite not entering it, the reek of death carried on the wind pierced my nostrils.
Shortly after, the constables who had cleared the interior emerged bearing the corpses, loading them onto a cart, and then covered them with straw matting to conceal them.
Yet the thick stench of death could not be contained.
The gathered crowd pinched their noses and grimaced, while those overcome by the foul odor retched and collapsed where they stood.
“Who on earth has died?”
“Indeed. They say more than a dozen are dead… what in the world is this…?”
I turned my gaze toward the murmurs echoing from all around and looked upon the corpses loaded in the cart.
One corpse was not properly covered, its form laid bare for all to see.
The wound piercing the brow was unmistakably from a dagger.
Poorly executed, the thrust bore the mark of desperation—driven with all available strength. The jagged, uneven nature of the wound alone suggested this was the work of someone gritting their teeth in grim determination.
“Young Master, this is…”
“Pay it no great mind. Whatever this may be, whether in the martial world or elsewhere, it is commonplace for people to die and be wounded for the sake of revenge or profit.”
So-ha nodded while keeping her gaze fixed upon the corpses being carried out.
Was she taking interest because she was a physician?
I gently drew her along and resumed walking.
“Let us simply observe the marketplace. Once we pass through here, we enter Hebei.”
“Ah… yes, of course.”
Yet she continued to stare at the corpses, her brow furrowed.
Though the straw matting obscured the proper clothing, a concealed pattern that seemed to symbolize something caught her attention in an oddly familiar way.
“What troubles you?”
“No, it is just… the pattern barely visible seems strangely familiar…”
“I suspect you are mistaken. With the corpses piled haphazardly, there is no way to see anything properly.”
“That… is true.”
So-ha nodded as if acknowledging the logic, then turned her gaze forward and ceased looking toward the cart.
She seemed certain it was indeed a mistake.
With a short sigh, she seemed to find peace of mind, her expression noticeably more at ease than before.
I broached a new topic to fully redirect her thoughts.
“Have you ever been to Seokgajang?”
“No, never. Most places like that have such brutal surveillance that someone like me would have been beaten and thrown out if I’d tried to enter.”
She spoke of frightening matters as though they were trivial.
Yet I couldn’t dismiss her words as false, for the scar marring Chaeseoha’s face was severe enough that others might reasonably mistake it for a plague.
Her desperate attempts to conceal her face were entirely understandable.
“You must have visited, Young Master? Especially during the festival.”
“I went. Though I didn’t enjoy it.”
I smiled faintly, recalling the past.
I remember it was around this same time of year.
A magnificent festival had unfolded, with the boisterous voices of crowds filling the streets everywhere, fireworks bursting here and there, masked dancers performing—truly a lively street overflowing with spectacles.
Yet within that revelry, I had engaged in a desperate chase.
One fleeing desperately to survive, others pursuing with intent to kill, while all around them, festival-goers simply enjoyed the celebration, indifferent to such struggles.
Now, looking back, it seemed a truly surreal sight.
I shook off the memory and turned my gaze away.
“If it was the Jin Family of Luoyang, you would have dined with the royal family. How could you not have enjoyed it?”
At her perfectly reasonable question, I nodded. Unfortunately, in the past, the Jin Family had ceased to exist, making it meaningless, and now while the Jin Family endures, we have no connection with that side.
“The Jin Family’s wealth and power are formidable. Thus, there are those who dislike the royal family growing closer to us.”
“The high officials?”
“The Emperor.”
“Ah.”
Throughout history, when nations have been overthrown, most rebellions have been led by royal families possessing wealth and power.
Therefore, the imperial court dislikes the Jin Family and royal families growing closer, and we, understanding this, maintain a certain distance.
We conduct transactions like the martial world does, but we refrain from actions that would deepen personal bonds.
Should this absolute rule ever break, it would only be when the power of the royal family leading a rebellion is so overwhelming that the odds of a new emperor ascending the throne approach near certainty.
So naturally, they would dislike it all the more.
I smiled and looked at her once more.
“But there’s something else I’m curious about… the Dan Li Family. Their Family Head was your father’s close friend, wasn’t he?”
“I heard they met while wandering through the Central Plains. They got along well and worked in similar fields, so they were a perfect match.”
A physician and a pharmacist.
Moreover, since the Uiseonchae clan cultivates both disciplines, the Dan Li Family would have had much to learn from them.
Medicine and pharmaceuticals of a different caliber.
The more they absorbed such knowledge, the more they could be certain their family would shine even brighter.
“So they tried to steal from the Chae Family.”
“If Father hadn’t noticed and escaped, I’m certain we would have been trapped forever. They pursued us so relentlessly… we ran for seven days without eating or sleeping, can you believe it?”
Recalling those times, Chaeseoha trembled with an unpleasant expression and clicked her tongue.
Though it seemed to have happened when she was quite young, the vividness with which she recalled every detail suggested she had endured a trauma she could never forget.
I found myself wearing a bitter smile.
“When I think about it, Father’s death was surely because of what happened then. He suffered many blade wounds and was gravely injured in numerous places.”
Another sigh escaped, and her voice reached my ears, yet strangely, it carried no resentment or anger.
As if she understood that what had slipped away could never be reclaimed, that grasping at it and venting her fury would not bring the dead back to life.
Considering her usual conduct, it seemed only natural, but I hadn’t realized she held the same perspective even toward my father’s affairs, let alone our ancestors.
I found myself questioning whether something was wrong with me, who had drawn my sword solely for revenge.
“Anyway, let’s stop dwelling on such gloomy matters. Besides, I’m hungry. Let’s eat and then depart.”
“That was my intention. If there’s something you wish to eat, go there. I’ll give you the choice.”
“Understood!”
Perhaps to shift the somber atmosphere, Chaeseoha began surveying her surroundings with eyes more vibrant than usual, searching for a place to satisfy her hunger.
As tantalizing aromas continued to assault her from every direction, she appeared quite deliberate in her search, as if genuinely uncertain where to go.
Watching her, I smiled softly and turned my gaze away.
Clatter-clatter-clatter!
Then.
A sudden commotion erupted, and I saw five men on horseback hurrying toward the administrative office.
None of them wore pleasant expressions.
Their clenched jaws and urgent pace suggested they had only just grasped the gravity of the situation.
I smiled and slowly followed behind Chaeseoha.

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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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