Chapter 60
“Welcome!”
Since business was slow and there wasn’t even a waiter, the innkeeper, who also doubled as the cook, greeted them himself.
“Are you here alone?”
Ignoring the woman’s friendly greeting, Namgung Uigyeol crossed his arms and scanned the room.
As expected of an inn with hardly any customers, there were no dangerous individuals in sight...
“What’s this? Isn’t that the adulterer from before?”
Just then, a cheerful voice came from a woman wearing a black bamboo hat.
“What!”
Namgung Uigyeol jumped in surprise.
The woman in the black bamboo hat was sitting by the window, sipping from a wine cup.
Perhaps because the ingredients weren’t fresh, she had barely touched the food on her plate.
Sensing something amiss, the warriors who had followed him shot into the inn like arrows.
“Grand Lord! What is the matter!”
But Namgung Uigyeol didn’t even glance at them. He merely glared at the woman with narrowed eyes. His face was as red as iron shoved into a furnace.
“Ha! W-w-what on earth are you talking about, miss?”
Unlike Namgung Uigyeol, who seemed to be boiling over, the woman looked as if she had no idea what he meant.
“It’s true, isn’t it? You followed me here after falling for me back at the place where the storyteller was. Did I mistake you for someone else?”
“U-uh...”
Flustered, Namgung Uigyeol froze like a statue. The woman tilted her head and muttered under her breath.
“Did I mistake him for someone else? No. It’s not like there are two such massive heads in Hefei.”
At those words, the subordinates who had followed him began to whisper.
“Now that I think about it, didn’t the Grand Lord go out to the market with the Clan Lord last time?”
“He said he came back after hearing the love story of the Clan Lord and the Head of the Medical Hall on the street. Could it be that day?”
Though they whispered as quietly as they could, Namgung Uigyeol, with his profound Inner Energy, heard every word.
The woman went a step further.
“But I found out you’re a married man, aren’t you? A man with a wife chasing after a woman because he fell for her. If that’s not an adulterer, what is?”
Namgung Uigyeol’s face turned deathly pale, as if he were about to crumble into dust.
“T-t-that is!”
I only followed you because I mistook you for someone suspicious, and when I got caught, I had to make up an excuse!
But if he said that, it was certain that this young lady, who was clearly the daughter of a prestigious martial family, would risk her life to challenge him to a duel.
Just as Namgung Uigyeol’s insides were burning black because he couldn’t reveal the truth either way, she spoke.
“Forget it. I’m waiting for someone anyway, so could you just leave?”
The woman looked bored as she extended the back of her hand to trim her sharp nails.
Then, she suddenly set her hand on the table and said,
“Oh? When did the presence of the child who was outside disappear?”
In that instant, Namgung Uigyeol’s boiling head turned as cold as if he had been doused by a waterfall.
The moment the warriors inside the inn looked at each other—
Whoosh!
The warriors of the Changcheon Unit shot outside without a moment’s hesitation.
- Miss!
- Miss Hong-seol!
But there was no one left on the empty street.
* * *
Hong-seol, having lost consciousness, was tossed onto the damp dirt floor like a pile of dust swept into a corner.
Above her, someone whispered.
“I-is she dead?”
“No. It looks like she’s just asleep because her meridians were struck. I’ll try to release them.”
Soon, a small hand pressed firmly somewhere on Hong-seol’s body.
Only after a long while did a small groan escape Hong-seol’s lips.
“Ugh...”
The surroundings seemed pitch black, and there was a musty smell of mold.
‘Where on earth is this...?’
She had clearly been walking with a light step toward the Music Inn.
She remembered something pressing on a few points on her body, and then her consciousness had faded.
‘I must have been put to sleep by having my meridians struck. Who on earth did it? And why?’
Hong-seol barely opened her hazy eyes.
“Eek!”
Startled, Hong-seol let out a sharp scream. It was because several grimy faces were looking down at her.
“W-who are you people?”
Hong-seol sat up with a start.
Perhaps because she had been lying on the cold ground, every part of her body ached.
As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she could see the faces of the children surrounding her in detail.
There seemed to be at least ten or thirteen of them.
‘What is this? Their clothes are all different.’
There were children wearing fairly neat clothes, and there was even a beggar boy wearing a hundred-patch robe mended in every possible place.
However, if they had one thing in common, it was that they were all as thin as sticks.
“Do you… do you have any food?”
The one who had spoken to Hong-seol without hesitation was a beggar boy half a head taller than her.
The boy, whose half-closed eyes were striking, was clutching his stomach as if he were terribly hungry.
“No, I don’t.”
Hong-seol replied, feeling sorry. At that, the beggar boy looked dejected, went to a corner, and buried his head between his knees.
“That’s Yang Do-jin. He’s been here the longest. That’s why he’s always looking for something to eat.”
It was the voice of a pretty but sharp-looking girl.
“Oh, you are...”
Hong-seol had definitely seen that face somewhere before.
Although when Hong-seol had met her, she had been disguised as Namgung Jeok.
“Could it be... Deng Soso?”
“You know me?”
Gasp!
It was her mistake. Hong-seol quickly made an excuse.
“I heard a rumor once. About the talented only daughter of the Deng Clan. That she has a talent for the Acupoint Striking Technique and...”
It was true that she had heard such things from Namgung Uigyeol.
Hong-seol hesitated for a moment before adding her own opinion.
“...That she is incredibly pretty.”
“Oh my, really?”
Deng Soso’s face turned red, and she playfully slapped Hong-seol’s shoulder.
‘She’s a very bright child.’
The moment Hong-seol thought that, Deng Soso’s expression soured.
“Ha, but why doesn’t Young Master Namgung Baek even glance at me?”
Her face looked as if she had dug a tunnel a mile deep.
Hong-seol blinked and thought,
‘Cancel that, cancel that! This child’s mood swings are extreme.’
When she didn’t respond, Deng Soso went a step further.
“If I die here like this... would Young Master Namgung Baek look at me even once...?”
As Deng Soso seemed to be digging her tunnel even deeper, Hong-seol changed the subject.
“My name is Hong-seol. You were the one who released my meridians, right? Thank you.”
“It’s nothing.”
Behind Deng Soso, who shrugged her shoulders, she could see the clear faces of the children.
Most of them seemed younger than Hong-seol.
Still, her heart felt a little more at ease knowing she wasn’t alone.
Hong-seol asked cautiously.
“How did you all end up here? Where is this? Who captured us?”
The children took turns saying a word each.
“Nobody knows that. I was captured by a traveler who came to my house while my mom and dad were out working in the fields three days ago.”
“I was peeing in an alley behind the market a week ago!”
“I was washing my feet by the stream the day before yesterday!”
They were all busy saying their piece. But only the beggar boy remained silent to the end.
Perhaps he didn’t have the energy to speak because he was too hungry.
“Sigh.”
Hearing their circumstances, Hong-seol sighed.
It meant that, in the end, no one knew why they had been captured or who had captured them.
“Is there no way to get out?”
At that, the children all shook their heads.
“How old is everyone?”
“I’m six.”
“Seven.”
“Five... Waaah! I want my mommy!”
Hong-seol wrapped her arms around the small child who had burst into tears.
‘I’m eight, so I’m the oldest sister here! I have to comfort the children.’
Just like Namgung Baek had done for her when she was crying.
Hong-seol tried hard to hold back her own tears and said to the child in her arms,
“What’s your name?”
“So-rang, I’m So-rang.”
“There, there! Now that big sister is here, don’t worry, So-rang. Big sister is eight years old!”
“R-really?”
Perhaps her unconvincing bravado had worked.
As Hong-seol slowly stroked her back, the five-year-old stopped crying immediately.
Deng Soso marveled.
“I’m eight too. You’re very mature.”
After wiping So-rang’s grimy face, Hong-seol looked around.
“This looks like an earthen cave. There are dirt walls on all sides, and there’s only one door.”
That was Deng Soso’s explanation.
Just as she said, as she walked through the darkness feeling the walls, she felt a rusted iron door.
“When does this open?”
“It usually doesn’t.”
Deng Soso replied. Hong-seol asked,
“Then how do they give you water and food?”
If they had been captured for over a week and were still alive, it meant someone was providing them with food and drink.
She knew this well because she had once been locked in a side room, starving.
“Once a day, when they give us terrible-tasting oat porridge, that part opens.”
The place Deng Soso pointed to was the bottom of the door.
There was a small lid attached with iron hinges, barely large enough for an adult’s head to pass through.
“As you can see, it’s not big enough for us to escape through.”
Deng Soso, who said that, sighed.
“You never know, if we don’t eat and get even thinner, we might be able to escape through there.”
It was then.
From far away, she heard the sound of heavy footsteps approaching.
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