Chapter 26

“You’ll take the punishment for me?”
I said to Namgung Mu Baek, whose frown deepened.
“Black Tiger, please allow me to share in the punishment he will receive.”
“What do you mean by paying for the punishment of one who has sullied the name of the Southern Palace? I say this with great deliberation. The Grand Duke.”
I didn’t expect him to call me by the name of Grand Duke, but he did. My response was equally tasteless.
“Yes. I will take the blame and share the punishment. I have said so, and I will do so.”
“Would you rather enter a black cage instead, or go to the military front and smell the blood incense?”
I had no intention of wasting another day in a dark den.
“Send me to the front. In the name of the Southern Palace, I will join you, raise the ball, and roll with you to avenge the Black Lake.”
“Frontline…….”
The Grand Duke’s words, which were simply thrown out, made Nangong Mu Baek’s eyes widen. It was as if he was unable to control his words and actions.
What is this thing saying now. Whether it really meant what he understood it to mean.
It met my eyes again and again.
It didn’t matter. I was moving to fulfill a promise to someone I wanted and to get what I wanted, not to make them understand.
“I understand that quite a few have already fallen in the name of the Southern Palace.”
As I said that, I turned around and met the gaze of my uncle, who was watching me from afar with a confused expression. The reason why the Southern Palace’s gaze was not strange was because of the incident with my uncle not long ago.
* * *
“You said you’d take care of it, but that’s all you said. At most, you got a chance to win the sword tournament, gain recognition, and get out of being a bastard!”
The nagging began. He wasn’t even covering his ears, but he was spewing out his frustrations in front of the patient.
“I’m a patient.”
“Patients are bullshit. If you’re going to suffer so much, you shouldn’t have tried so hard to run.”
“Uncle.”
“You are ridiculous. A front? Did you say a military front?”
“Uncle.”
“What more is there to say!”
I called him out again and again.
The elderly man, who was far from his usual emotion of anger, listened to my muffled voice after I spewed out my words several more times.
“This is the path I have chosen, and it is the path I must take.”
“It’s a hard road,” he said, ”and it’s a long one. Moreover, it is the way back.”
“Trust me.”
The old man chewed his lower lip hard at those words.
“Only stand by me, no matter how much anyone else criticizes me, denigrates me, or belittles me. Please stand by me unwaveringly, that’s what I want.”
“Is this what you meant. Did you mean to say such things to me, and then tell me that I was right, and that I should agree with everything you said?”
I let out a short smile at that.
“Hoo hoo hoo.”
“……Why are you laughing.”
“Can I take that as an acknowledgment of me, after a year of being an asshole just to hear you say that?”
“You’re so stubborn ……, who do you think you are?”
“Don’t tell me, I’ll just say you’re his nephew.”
“That’s it, you’re just a mouthful!”
The old man’s anger showed no sign of abating.
“I must go before it’s too late. If I stay here and compete for the title, the family will only become more dreary, and I think the least I can do is to get out of your way.”
“If that’s really what it’s about, then I’ll……!”
“It can’t be just that. I’ve never been good enough. I needed to be pounded a little more, so this is the path I chose.”
“Then tell me why the battlefield.”
“Because of my …… past mistakes. As you know, there’s not much talk in the military.”
The uncle furrowed his brow and clenched his teeth.
“You must mean the imperial family.”
“Yes.”
The reason why the strongest martial artists in the Southern Palace as well as in the Zhongyuan Martial Realm were flocking to the battlefield like moths to a flame was first, money, and second, the imperial order.
In my previous life, I was an outcast, and the military was the path I took to get attention, to save my mother, and to make a little bit of a name for myself. One of the reasons for my decision to join the military was always the same story.
The huge amount of money that goes into the military.
The army was seen as a money-grubbing ghost, and the imperial family, who ran the military, turned their attention to the Zhongyuan army.
“With so many people with swords, how can there be no one to serve the country? I order you to find them and recruit them into the army!”
It was the emperor’s order. There was no rigorous selection process.
However, the schools and families of the Zhongyuan Martial Clan, unwilling to part with their disciples who were related to them by blood or through a long line of succession, would send those they deemed worthless, or those who needed to pay for their sins.
Or, like me, they would voluntarily join the army, hoping to make a name for themselves.
The imperial court was putting pressure on the families and factions that were prominent in the Southern Palace and the Middle Yuan Clan.
“If you don’t send the right people, the Gold Council will appear in person. ”
Bandits, both red and green. Hordes of demons were rampaging through the country, and neighboring countries were snapping at the fledgling imperial family like hyenas.
It was time for the imperial family to consolidate its position. Feeling threatened, the imperial family roasted the Zhongyuan warlords.
The eyes of my uncle, who knew the whole situation, seemed to have narrowed. His reaction raised my spirits.
“I need to meet with Elder Yue Yue of the Southern Palace.”
“You want to meet with him about fishermen.”
“I’m trying to paint a picture, but I can’t do it with just a brush and anvil. I need to eat, and someone needs to tell me to shut up and fill my stomach.”
* * *
The deeply contemplative eyes of Namgung Mubai looked directly at me. I felt like I was looking at someone beyond, but I didn’t care.
“Do you really think that for the sake of the Southern Palace, you will give yourself to…….”
“Please decide.”
“……It is not a decision that can be made easily. We’ll decide tomorrow at the jiaju meeting.”
With those words, I descended the sword circle. It was a moment when I felt the shadows swaying in the light with each step I took.
I made my way back down the stairs, passing by the dazed elders until I came upon the one at the end.
It was Namgung Yewol.
* * *
“Impossible.”
He was a little old man in the back room.
He looked even more determined than his uncle next to him.
I thought so.
“Well, unless it’s a military front, that’s another story.”
I snapped. As if she had known I was coming, Nan Gongyue did not hesitate to make eye contact with me. If anything, her gaze was so inwardly focused that I wanted to avert my gaze.
“There are a total of three places where the imperial family commands the use of middle-ranked martial artists. The first is to deal with the red-haired enemies that have historically plagued the imperial family, the second is to build a front from neighboring countries and face the upheavals of the times, and the third is to quell the chaos caused by bandits, bandits, and demonic hordes.”
In my previous life, I was assigned to the most dangerous and near-death front against the Red Army. Perhaps that’s how I rose to the rank of Captain of the Ten Thousand People, a position notorious for its brashness, and not from an orthodox military family.
Once again, I wanted first. But the Southern Palace cried out that it was impossible.
“The First Elder is looking for a reason.”
“Yes, if the Grand Duke wishes to share in the punishment of the man called Black Lake, as the Grand Duke has said, and if there is something else he wishes to do with his life, then the first and second are impossible. One.”
Nangong Yue smiled wryly. The sight of her grown grandson made her body itch once again.
“If I told you that I was going to volunteer for the front that stands in opposition to the Green Forest, which holds the Southern Palace and its pretenders, I would have no reason to stop you, no reason to refuse you.”
He had a point. I shook my head, but I could still feel the gaze of the Southern Palace Lady.
“It will be at least five years, for the punishment is not small.”
“I’ve made up my mind.”
“It won’t be like here. You won’t eat, you won’t rest. Some days you’ll wake up and not be able to sleep.”
It was familiar.
“Those who share their hearts will die by the blind hand of the sword.”
There were dozens a day.
“The land will be so desolate that the enemy will be indistinguishable from the enemy, for they will be reduced to mere sword-bearers on the battlefield, not grand dukes.”
As he spoke, he met Nangong Yue’s eyes.
“Even so, I don’t know what makes you look at me like that.”
“I’ve always been suspicious of your path.”
“…….”
“But now I can’t afford not to.”
The words had a different weight to them than the flippant ones spoken by others.
“Farewell.”
Unlike the others, Nangong Yue didn’t tell me to change my mind, to change my thoughts.
She said.
“And prove it.”
She wants me to prove it.
“That the Nangong, the Nangong, is enough.”
The male half of my previous life showed me the male half of the female half.
Thinking of Namgung.
Worried about Namgung.
I could see that she wanted Namgung to move forward in the right direction.
Next, Nangong Yueyul spoke up.
“Dal Po, please allow me time to train the Grand Duke in swordsmanship while you are away.”
“Elder ……1, you?”
“Yes. How about it, Grand Duke?”
Southern Palace Yeoul.
Despite being the first elder of the Southern Palace, he is considered to be far less powerful in terms of his political standing.
However.
She still holds her position for a reason.
Kwak.
The hand of the guardian deity that has protected the Southern Palace for decades.
That day.
After a long hiatus from the Zhongyuan Martial Forest, he returned to his family and laid down his sword.
Birthed by Chang Chen,
Namgung Yue, who is considered to be the first master of the sword, announced that she would take on disciples for the first time in her life.