Why is he here?
Cho Yoon scanned the interior for a moment, struggling to catch up with the whirlwind situation.
He had noticed the uninvited guest’s presence long before arriving at the Sea Fog Hall, but since the children’s energy felt calm, he had been relieved. However, the conversation drifting from afar seemed far from ordinary, so he opened the door, only to find yet another character from the novel.
A man with bright, sand-colored hair and eyes stood there, wearing the upright, handsome face of a noble scion. He was tall and well-proportioned, his posture impeccable as he bowed respectfully.
It was none other than the Young Clan Head of the Moyong Clan, Moyong Dan.
He’d thought meeting Moyong Dan would be a headache. He had coldly shaken off even the protagonist and left… only to return to the villa he’d expected to be cozy and comfortable, and find the genius he wanted to avoid standing tall right there. If he’d known this would happen, he would have met those troublesome brothers all at once.
Regretting it belatedly changed nothing.
After letting out a silent sigh, the trouble he had barely pushed to a corner of his mind suddenly resurfaced. Cho Yoon’s feet, stepping over the threshold, froze.
Wait a minute, but seriously, why is he here? I heard them arguing about whether to grant a duel or not, but what did they talk about before that? This person heard everything about the regression from his brother, right? Don’t tell me he mentioned that?
As a master of the Profound Realm, “Cho Yoon” possessed considerable baseline physical attributes. Even standing still, he could hear the splash of a fish far away, and looking at a distant mountain, he could see a bird flapping its wings on a branch.
Truly, it was an ability perfect for invading others’ privacy.
The sounds of the surroundings drifting in even without conscious effort left Cho Yoon tired before he realized it. Thus, he made an effort to reduce the radius of his sensory perception, setting it so he could detect only moving presences in all directions when necessary.
That was why, on his way here, Cho Yoon had only heard Moyong Dan and the children bickering about a duel. He only knew Moyong Dan’s appearance, actions, and personality from the novel, and had never heard his voice, so he hadn’t even realized the man was Moyong Dan. He had merely wondered what kind of brazen fellow was begging his kids for a spar like that.
So he was debating in front of the door whether to wait with a relaxed mind until the conversation ended or ask for understanding and interrupt, when Sa-yeong’s voice caught him.
Sa-yeong’s words carried out to him from inside. “If you need a place to have a chat with Master, I will try speaking to him, Great Hero Seven Star Sword.”
Wasn’t Seven Star Sword Moyong Dan’s title? It was just moments ago that he had barely managed to end the meeting and run away, and now Sa-yeong was arranging another meeting between that guy and him?
Startled, he went inside, and sure enough, there was Moyong Dan. For some reason, Sa-hyeon’s complexion didn’t look good. Cheon-oh’s usual face was tinged with deep gladness, and Sa-yeong was—
“Welcome back, Master!”
She was clearly delighted to see him. It seemed her conversation with Moyong Dan hadn’t been to her liking at all.
Cho Yoon crossed the threshold and closed the door.
Once inside, he hung the bamboo hat he held in one hand on the back of his empty chair and sat down. Sa-yeong immediately sat as well, and Sa-hyeon and Cheon-oh followed suit. Moyong Dan, who remained standing until the end, only lowered himself stiffly after Cho Yoon gestured as if granting permission.
To calm his mind, Cho Yoon picked up the half-cooled teapot, warmed it with inner energy, and tilted it over an empty cup.
“You must have known I just came from meeting your brother.”
“Yes, Immortal Healer Great Hero. It is an honor to have an audience with you like this.”
“The younger brother to the master, the older brother to the disciple. You two really set your minds to it. Did you come to say the same thing as him? That suddenly pointing a sword in broad daylight was unavoidable, and since you don’t know why you did it, you had to meet me?”
Startled by the words leaving his own mouth, Cho Yoon let the teapot rattle in his hand. He calmly put down the tea set and lifted the precariously filled teacup with both hands. It was fortunate that a martial artist’s body didn’t tremble easily.
He could clearly see the children rolling their eyes awkwardly at their master’s scathing remarks, heard for the first time in a while. Cho Yoon cursed his own mouth, which never seemed to come with brakes, as he calmly took a sip of tea.
Moyong Dan, rolling the words in his mouth, spoke.
“It only overlaps because we discussed carefully, several times, how to speak if we met you, Great Hero. Coming here and requesting a duel was solely my arbitrary decision.”
“So you’re saying your brother and your clan are without fault? Even if you care for each other tearfully while causing trouble for others, you’ll only buy more antipathy.”
Having delivered a cold rebuke, Cho Yoon calmly drew out a thin thread of inner energy.
The invisible, formless power stretched out slowly and touched Moyong Dan’s eardrum, and Cho Yoon sent a telepathic message with content different from his spoken words. His head was complicated and his body tired, but apart from that, there was something he had to ask Moyong Dan, preferably without the children, who were staring blankly at the same table, knowing.
“I have no intention of arguing right or wrong over such a matter, so if you plan to lay out only lengthy, glossy apologies, leave early.”
[I heard he confessed to you the fact that Seo-ha returned by turning back time?]
Moyong Dan, listening to the venomous words with his head bowed, blinked slowly. He must have been surprised by the sudden telepathy and its content, but he seemed determined not to show it.
Moyong Dan paused for a moment, then answered slowly.
It seemed he quickly got used to speaking with his mouth while sending telepathy, following Cho Yoon’s lead.
“I apologize for making you uncomfortable, Great Hero. Awe and greed took precedence, and I committed a foolish act.”
[Yes, he told me four years ago.]
“It would be fear rather than respect, and greed rather than awe. Knowing it is a disgraceful act, you should have tried not to do it, yet here you are.”
[Do you have the crow-shaped divine artifact?]
“…”
Hearing Cho Yoon’s question, Moyong Dan shut his mouth tight. On the surface, it looked as if he had run out of excuses in the face of the consecutive reprimands.
Just where is that divine artifact that everyone keeps reacting to so ambiguously?
An object that would have naturally stayed by Moyong Seo’s side in the original work had lost its place, so Cho Yoon had absolutely no idea where it might be. He’d only asked because he had heard Moyong Dan managed it, so why was there no answer again?
Looking around, it seemed Cho Yoon wasn’t the only one with irritation built up. Sa-yeong, who had been suffering since before Moyong Dan appeared, didn’t even hide her scowl, and Sa-hyeon still looked restless, his condition quite poor. What did he hear to be like that? When Cho Yoon’s gaze touched Sa-hyeon, the quick-witted Sa-yeong looked at her master and shook her head slightly, an expression that clearly meant now isn’t the time.
Only then did Cho Yoon shift his gaze to Cheon-oh.
The pitch-black stare that had been fixed on him even while Cho Yoon looked elsewhere now felt like it carried direct pressure. Cho Yoon, accustomed to those unconditional eyes, met the child’s gaze nonchalantly before turning his attention back to Moyong Dan.
Just in time, it seemed Moyong Dan had decided something.
“My impatience offended you, so I will withdraw for today.”
[To tell you the truth, the divine artifact disappeared without a trace long ago. Since the event had already happened, announcing suddenly that it vanished would likely plunge those involved into confusion, so I was in the middle of making a substitute.]
What?
The crow divine artifact disappeared? Then what about the protagonist? The regression? The hero?
Hearing the transmitted telepathy, Cho Yoon’s heart plummeted with a dull thud.
It wasn’t a protagonist he had raised, nor a novel he had written, but he couldn’t believe a key element responsible for a major axis of the story had vanished out of the blue.
As he couldn’t form a response in his bewildered state, Moyong Dan rose from his seat, pushed in his chair, and bowed to Cho Yoon with perfect form.
“Please do not be too angry. I apologize, Great Hero. I will consider having shared a table with you the honor of a lifetime.”
[It seems I cannot explain in detail here. I will arrange a spot outside the Hao Sect at the beginning of the Hour of the Monkey (3–5 PM) and wait. I hope you have a peaceful night.]
Having offered a bow respectful beyond measure, Moyong Dan left the room without waiting to be seen off. The sound of him crossing the garden with steady strides and opening the main gate to leave carried clearly. As Cho Yoon sensed the uninvited guest’s presence fading into the distance and let out a small sigh, Sa-yeong, watching her master, spoke as if she had been waiting.
“What bad luck! What was that? Did he entrust a duel to us or something? He says he came to apologize, but then he asks to fight. What kind of mindset is that? A guy who couldn’t make a peep and ran away as soon as Master came!”
“Sa-yeong.”
“I can’t take it. I’m leaving the Hao Sect. Getting pushed around by a guy like that, with justification, makes no sense. I’ll just go back to being a disciple under Master too. And what’s with him glaring at me just because I watched his brother’s every move a little? Did he not deceive my brother?”
“Calm down for now. Wouldn’t he have a reason he couldn’t back down either, to come all this way and risk discord?”
Sa-yeong, who had thrown a tantrum perhaps because too much had piled up, calmed her anger obediently, though her face remained dissatisfied.
Cho Yoon gathered his scattered thoughts and spoke gently to Sa-hyeon, who hadn’t said a word yet.