Three Thousand Court Ladies - Chapter 92

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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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Chapter 92
It came without warning.
Wol-ya opened his eyes in the Mountain Hideout. It was the seventh morning since he and the Wol-rang-dan had routed the bandit gang.
Clearing the hideout didn’t end with vanquishing the bandits. They freed the imprisoned commoners and converted the treasures in the stores to grain, distributing it among those who had suffered losses.
What remained was the fate of the hideout itself.
“Commander, shall we burn it all down?”
Dam-no spoke gently, responding to Young-rok’s suggestion.
“If the fire spreads across the whole mountain, what then?”
“It’s been rather dry, so it might be dangerous. Then shall we axe it down? We can demolish it completely and distribute the wood as firewood before we leave.”
“If there’s no better use for it, that’s the only way.”
This time Wol-ya answered.
The hideout stood solidly atop a cliff, built with log frames and earthen walls—quite a substantial structure.
It seemed wasteful to tear it down without a purpose, so they were considering alternatives when suddenly a member of the Wol-rang-dan came running from the entrance.
“Grave news, sir. There’s been a disturbance at the palace.”
“At the palace?”
The Celestial Maiden arrived with only a single attendant. The attendant who came with her was severely wounded and is undergoing treatment.”
Wol-ya immediately ran toward the hideout entrance.
The Celestial Maiden, Nok-hwa, stood at the entrance. Her pristine white robes were stained with blood in numerous places—a sign that the situation was grave.
Moreover, aside from the attendant she spoke of, no other servants could be seen. When venturing outside, she customarily traveled with about a dozen attendants—it was strange indeed.
Arriving before Nok-hwa, who seemed half-dazed, Wol-ya asked her gently.
“What happened? How did you come to be in such a state—”
Nok-hwa turned to look at Wol-ya with vacant eyes, her lips trembling.
“Please, save Jeong-ho.”
It seemed to be the name of the attendant who had come with her. His pristine martial robes were likewise soaked in blood. As Wol-ya pushed through the circle of Wol-rang-dan members around him, the one taking his pulse shook his head.
“He has ceased breathing.”
At those words, Nok-hwa collapsed to her knees. Until now she had been able to endure because at least one person remained alive.
“Ah, Jeong-ho.”
Nok-hwa crawled on her knees toward her guardian. Once her eyes confirmed that he no longer breathed, she let out a wail.
At her grief, both Wol-ya and the Wol-rang-dan fell silent. A terrible fire kindled in their hearts. Who could possibly have dared to strike at the Celestial Maiden in the divine land of Nak-rang?
Wol-ya wanted to ask what had happened, but he waited for Nok-hwa to compose herself.
After Nok-hwa had wept so violently it seemed she would empty herself entirely, she looked up at Wol-ya with bloodshot eyes.
“The Goguryeo Army launched a surprise attack and seized the palace.”
The palace?
Wol-ya could not comprehend which palace she meant. Nak-rang was an extraordinarily small nation, and its borders aligned precisely with the jurisdiction of the Ja-myeong-go.
The king’s residence and the two secondary palaces all lay within that protection. As long as the Ja-myeong-go stood, a surprise attack should have been impossible.
Not only Wol-ya but the Wol-rang-dan members as well wore expressions of bewilderment—and Nok-hwa began to laugh with a hollow, broken sound. Her voice turned sharp and cutting.
“The princess fell for the schemes of the Prince Ho-dong and tore open the Ja-myeong-go. The Goguryeo forces came over the mountainside and attacked at dawn. Caught sleeping before such numbers, we crumbled without resistance.”
Silence fell over the gathering.
“The king—”
“He took the princess’s life and surrendered. Now there is no Nak-rang. The divine nation has fallen.”
It was unthinkable that a kingdom could vanish in a single dawn. As the faces of those he had bade farewell to a week prior passed before his mind’s eye, Wol-ya shut his eyes tightly, then opened them again.
Soon after, Wol-ya’s command fell heavy and resolute.
“We withdraw. Prepare yourselves.”
The Wol-rang-dan members scattered in perfect order. At that moment, a dispatch rider bearing the Nak-rang flag arrived.
The one who descended from the horse as if tumbling was Yong-young, the youngest member of the Wol-rang-dan, whom they had left behind at the palace.
“A message from the king: Since Nak-rang has submitted to Goguryeo, Prince Wol-ya and the Wol-rang-dan must not return. You must depart.”
Yong-young shouted the words, then began to weep. His voice broke with sorrow as he continued.
“He said this is his final command and you must obey it without fail.”
Final command.
Those words pierced Wol-ya’s heart.
The king—his father—was ordering him to abandon everything and flee as a defeated coward. Though Wol-ya understood it came from a desire to see him survive, bitterness rose faster than reason.
“Pack only what is essential. I must go to the castle.”
The moment Wol-ya gave the order to Dam-no, Yong-young shook his head.
“The king has been taken as a hostage. He said that should you come, he would take his own life. I beg you—preserve yourself for the future.”
“Father—”
The king was not a man given to false words.
He could not obey the command and flee. Yet if he returned to the castle, his father would surely end his own life.
Like a man adrift on a rudderless ship, Wol-ya stood lost and vacant.
Then his mind turned toward Heaven’s Capital.
“I will go to Heaven’s Capital and save the remaining attendants there. I cannot promise our lives will see the end of this journey. Those who wish to leave may do so.”
Nok-hwa scoffed at Wol-ya’s resolve.
“The attendants have already fallen. The child who came with me is the last of them. They all threw away their lives to get me out. Do not tell me their existence was merely for that purpose.”
Hearing that there were no attendants left to rescue, Wol-ya lost his way once more. Helplessness crushed him.
“I am sorry.”
Both the one who apologized and the one who received it had empty eyes. After gazing at Wol-ya’s face for a long moment, Nok-hwa murmured with hollow despair.
“Now that the attendants are gone, the next Celestial Maiden will be born somewhere unknown, never understanding what she is, only to die.”
Though she was not blaming him, the weight upon his shoulders grew unbearable.
Wol-ya had been born a prince and raised to ascend the throne. Leading the Wol-rang-dan and solving problems great and small, the people of Nak-rang had shown him deference. He had taken for granted that following his father as king was his destined future.
But now he was nothing more than a ferryman stripped of his boat and destination. Wol-ya sought wisdom from Nok-hwa.
“What should I do?”
At that, Nok-hwa’s presence transformed entirely.
“Avenge the Fallen Nation’s hatred.”
Nok-hwa unfastened the Ja-myeong-ryeong hanging from her waist and held it out to him.
“Find Prince Ho-dong. Kill him eight times by your own hand and annihilate his soul. That is my wish.”
When one is slain eight times by the same person, the soul cannot enter the cycle of reincarnation and is destroyed utterly. That was the vengeance she sought.
Wol-ya accepted the Ja-myeong-ryeong.
As he grasped the Contamination that would lead him to the one he sought, the face of Prince Ho-dong—he who had once harbored romantic feelings for his sister—appeared in his mind. So too did the face of his sister, who had smiled like a blossom and spoken of having found someone to cherish.
“I shall have my revenge.”
Wol-ya spoke with fierce resolve.
Nok-hwa, gazing at the contours of the mountain, let out a hollow laugh.
She had seen this place in a dream. It was the moment when that incomprehensible dreamscape became reality.
“I thought it distant. Since last year, I have glimpsed the Moment of Converged Fate, yet it seemed so strange. It was a forest I had never seen before. And I—I had no reason to die. I loved life so much, loved the attendants, loved the nation, loved this world.”
Nok-hwa stood upon the cliff edge she had seen in her dream. Now that she was there, she understood. This was the exact place.
“I wish for you to fulfill your revenge.”
With those words, she held Wol-ya and the Wol-rang-dan members in her gaze one final time, then threw herself from the cliff.
The reason a Celestial Maiden is special is that the world listens intently to her wishes. Most of all, a wish spoken at the Moment of Converged Fate is carved into the very fabric of the world.
And so Wol-ya and the Wol-rang-dan’s lives became bound to vengeance.
Both in life and in death.

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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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