Sometimes, there are days like this.
When you lie down to sleep, but your eyes stubbornly refuse to close, and it feels like sleep will never come.
Realizing that he wouldn't be able to fall asleep easily, Baek Woo-jin decided to go for a walk for a while, looking at the bright moonlight streaming through the window.
“It feels good.”
The pleasant breeze danced around, and the resplendent moonlight illuminated the path ahead. Walking under this moonlight, it felt like something good was bound to happen if he kept walking.
At the corner of the academy, where his feet led him, there was a quaint pond, a pavilion, and a pair of a man and a woman.
Though they were at a considerable distance, thanks to the bright moonlight, recognizing them wasn't difficult.
"Nam Gungsu… Yeon-mae?"
Baek Woo-jin couldn't understand the scene before his eyes.
Yeon-mae, Yoo Hwa-yeon, was engaged to Baek Woo-jin.
“Why is Yeon-mae doing this…?”
Due to the unchanging attitude of his fiancee, who was difficult to approach, many tried to seduce her without much success. What on earth was she doing with Nam Gungsu, who had no connection to her, in a charming pavilion in the middle of the night.
Baek Woo-jin gathered the meager internal qi he had recently acquired and focused it on his ears. The distant conversation between the two began to faintly reach him.
"Yeon-mae."
"......!"
The first words that came out of Nam Gungsu's mouth plunged Baek Woo-jin into shock. Only Baek Woo-jin, who had promised her the future, could call Yoo Hwa-yeon “Yeon-mae.”
The only person who could call Yoo Hwa-yeon a kite hawk was himself, the one who had promised her a future.
"Gaga."
"What....?"
Yoo Hwa-yeon's response was even more shocking. Instead of hesitating to use the term "Gaga," which she had only called him, she expressed it confidently towards Nam Gungsu.
“It's time for you to come into my arms, isn't it?”
Nam Gungsu naturally reached out and pulled her into his arms.
Yoo Hwa-yeon also didn't seem to mind, and after pouting lightly, she quietly nestled in his arms, her face blushing.
"The relationship between the heads of our Yoo family and the heads of the Ximseop Baek family is more close than you think, Gaga.”
Yoo Hwa-yeon gently stroked his face, which looked like a man, with her slender and delicate hand as she moved away from Nam Gungsu's arms, saying, "To break the marriage between such noble lords…, there must be a good reason, right?”
Nam Gungsu wiped his face and, as her retreating hand reached a distance, gently clasped it. "Yes, when I become a Divine Dragon, that should be reason enough."
"That's right. If I become a divine dragon, that will be reason enough."
The Divine Dragon, a title granted to only one of the first-year students in the Jungmu Academy. It not only meant the strongest among the first-year students, but it was also considered to be one of the pillars that will lead the orthodox martial arts world.
"I don't doubt that you will become the Divine Dragon, Gaga. But….”
She smiled warmly, but then, as if she had been someone else, she pulled out her hand that had been caught and continued speaking with a haughty face.
"I don't want to look like a fish that has already been caught. Hehe…”
She knew exactly how to drive a man crazy. Nam Gungsu made a regretful expression, but he renewed his determination when he saw her seductive smile.
“Then, let’s end our night walk for now.”
“Hehe, just wait a little longer. The day I will hold Yeon-mae in my arms is not far away.”
“I’ll be waiting, hehe.”
As the two people finished their conversation and turned in his direction, Baek Woo-jin, who had been staring blankly, hurriedly hid in the bushes and covered his mouth and nose with both hands.
‘What did I see...?’
Even though he saw it with his own two eyes, he still couldn't believe it. He didn’t want to believe that the woman who had always embraced him and comforted him whenever he was frustrated and despaired had abandoned him and promised her future to another man.
"Aaah...."
Making a deflated sound, Baek Woo-jin, staggering, returned to his room. He closed his eyes, hoping that everything he had seen was just a dream of one night.
* * * * *
Even after waking up, nothing had changed; on the contrary, a colder reality awaited him.
"Hey, Woo-jin."
While returning to the academy after completing a light mission, his childhood friend Shin Ye-hwa, who had been with him all the way to the present, called him out.
"Is something wrong? It seems like you can't concentrate at all during missions."
Even though it had been a few days, Baek Woo-jin's mind was constantly filled with the conversation between Nam Gungsu and Yoo Hwa-yeon.
As a result, he made mistakes even in simple missions, so Shin Ye-hwa had to bear all the burden.
"Oh, it's nothing."
He wanted to tell her everything, thinking that it would be okay if it was his childhood friend, but he ended up closing his mouth. He felt like their relationship would break the moment he told her everything.
"Um, then, I have a favor to ask you."
"What favor?"
She fidgeted her fingers and squirmed her body as if she was embarrassed.
"This time... Moo Hyuk's brother is coming back, right?"
Baek Mu-hyuk.
Baek Woo-jin's older brother and the eldest son of the Ximseop Baek family. Unlike his younger brother who rarely improved his skills, he was already at the peak of his skills, surpassing the novice stage and expected to reach the upper stage soon, and receiving great expectations by the orthodox martial arts world beyond the academy.
"If it's okay, would you mind setting up a meeting with brother Mu-hyuk?"
The always confident expression on her face was blushing and avoiding eye contact.
"You, you mean...?"
"Y-yes. I actually..., I actually like brother Mu-hyuk."
He felt a sinking feeling in his chest.
‘Why?’
Even though they had been friends for a long time, they were not in a romantic relationship. But why? He never thought that she would have a good man until now.
'Why....'
It was the same as then. His heart pounded unpleasantly, just as it had when she had seen Nam Gungso and Yoo Hwa-yeon together.
"I-I see."
His mind heated up.
The people who were precious to him kept leaving, one by one.
* * * * *
As time passed, Baek Woo-jin withered away.
Eating felt like chewing sand, and he had no desire to do anything.
Despite this, there was no one to worry about him. Yoo Hwa-yeon seemed to be distancing herself gradually, and Shin Ye-hwa spent more time with Baek Mu-hyuk, who had returned to the academy after completing a long mission, as if she was trying to build a serious relationship with him.
Occasionally, others expressed concern for him, but whenever he felt that relationships were getting deeper, he somehow slipped away.
Baek Woo-jin, who was left alone, took on a mission in an unfavorable situation. It was a mission that was forcibly assigned to him to fill the predetermined performance score. The mission wasn't particularly difficult—a lowest-level mission that only required them to clean up a small mountain hut with a third-rate martial artist as the bandit leader.
"Kkkkk, this kid is a student of the great Jungmu Academy."
"Maybe he's a fake?"
"That's right. Khahahahat!"
Baek Woo-jin, who hadn't been eating properly and hadn't been practicing, couldn't handle their numbers and fell to his knees.
"Ugh, ugh..."
Intense pain shot through his side where the axe had struck.
'Why...'
As death loomed, the question of 'why' reigned his mind once again. Why was everyone leaving?
He wanted to ask them that question, which he had been holding back for so long because he didn't have the courage.
'I have to live.'
Baek Woo-jin turned his back and started to run away.
"Hey, that kid is running away!"
"Catch him right away!"
He ran through the mountains, trying to ignore the blood dripping from his side.
'Damn it, damn it!'
His lack of internal qi caught up to him.
The place where his footsteps stopped after wandering in the forest for a long time was an open space hidden among the dense trees.
"Kukkk...."
While he seemed to have successfully evaded the bandits, the situation was dire.
Trying to wash off the blood in a small stream left him soaked, and blood was once again oozing from his side.
Unprepared and without healing ointments, he found himself in a desperate situation.
"Ahh..."
Desperate to survive, he continued running, but it seemed like the end was near.
* * * * *
"Oh, darn it."
Baek Woo-jin's breath was almost gone when Juseon (the Wine Immortal) arrived in the mortal world with a large bag on his back.
Seeing the man unexpectedly wounded and lying on the ground, Juseon cursed under his breath and quickly approached.
"This is bad, this is bad."
Baek Woo-jin was already dead. Juseon briefly wondered if he could have saved him if he had arrived a bit earlier but didn't dwell on regret. If Baek Woo-jin's fate was to live, he would have lived regardless of it, and he died because he was destined to die.
"Where shall I go...?"
The reason he descended here was singular: to gather the herbs needed for brewing wine.
"Where was it when I checked with the heavenly eye... Huh?"
As he was searching through the bushes, Juseon suddenly paused. He hurriedly returned to the spot where the man's body lay.
"No, what is this...?"
From the seemingly lifeless body, Juseon sensed faint heartbeats and the sound of breathing.
"Must be a ghost's trickery."
The pale, cold face was flushed with color, and Juseon felt an unknown pull of fate from him.
"Huh, really."
A divine being who had ascended to the immortal realm should not be able to have any connection with any human in the mortal realm, let alone form one.
"Khukkk!”
Blood spurted from the man's mouth, snapping Juseon out of his reverie.
"I guess I should at least save him for now and see."
Juseon's hands started to move quickly.
- - - - - End of Chapter. . .Thanks for Reading - - - - -
Translator's Notes:-
1. Gaga is a term of endearment. You will hear it a lot in Chinese dramas.
2. This is my first time TLing / MTLing a murim novels and they are really hard to translate / MTL. I hope you do forgive the mistakes I make along the way and help me improve.
3. Merry Christmas!!!
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