Drip. Drip.Water drops fell into the cup. Gauging the amount, Sohwa estimated the time.When the fine line etched on the cup sank beneath the water, Sohwa took her eyes off the water clock. In the pupils she raised, the wound on the back of her hand was reflected. The bleeding had stopped, but the cut had not closed.'The effect lasts for more than two quarters.'Three pills lay on the worktable. There had originally been seven, but because she kept taking them to check reaction time, only three remained now.She had divided the formula into seven stages and made the pills accordingly; starting from the fourth pill, they produced a paralysis effect of more than two quarters.She had worried she might need to take the seventh pill for it to last longer than two quarters, but fortunately the effect was excellent. The medicinal stock must have been good. The ingredients gathered in the Blood Demon’s residence were beyond comparison to what she had procured in the Central Plains.'Whether it will react the same in the Blood Demon’s body remains to be seen.'Sohwa placed the fifth pill into a wooden case. Then she wrapped the remaining sixth and seventh pills in paper and slipped them into her pouch.Leaving the wooden case meant for the Blood Demon right on the compounding table, she tucked the pouch into her sleeve.Her gaze brushed the wound for a moment. Perhaps the potency had ebbed, for the wound was disappearing. The duration of efficacy held between two and three quarters.Having tidied the compounding table, Sohwa moved to the desk.She had finished the pills, but there was no time to rest. There was a mountain of work to do.The desk was piled high with sheets for drying ink.Not knowing when the Blood Demon might close off the archive and forbid entry, Sohwa cut her sleep short to copy over the secret texts.She stacked each sheet once the ink dried, organizing them. Then, grinding fresh ink, she continued transcribing the contents of the secret texts she had examined that morning.Each time she filled a sheet, she slid it aside to dry, took out a new one, and wrote again. Before long, records enough to cover half the desk had been arranged.Sohwa’s busy hand stopped. A long shadow fell across the paper.When she lifted her head, she saw Hae-rak bent at the waist.Perching on the desk, he picked up the sheet at the edge.“Still copying over the secret texts?”Perhaps sensing something odd, Hae-rak narrowed one eye.“So you’re thinking of leaving Geumeunsan? Seeing how you’re preparing to sneak the texts out.”Sohwa nodded.“I told you I’d find you a place in the Outland.”Hae-rak sneered. Sohwa ★ 𝐍𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 ★ answered his derision evenly.“Do you not still have the Palace Lord’s descendants and a martial art? With that, you can fully establish the grounds to rebuild the Sun Palace.”“Grounds?”Continuing her transcription, Sohwa replied.“Be glad the Blood Demon is a madman. He recorded not only you, but other bloodlines in excessive detail. Though countless bloodlines mingled, as you see, every person’s name and affiliation is precisely recorded. You, having inherited the last Palace Lord’s blood, can claim legitimacy.”A newly filled sheet landed before Hae-rak.Inside were names, countless names. The characters stretched without end, as if taking root.Hae-rak exhaled a sigh.“Sohwa. This isn’t a dynasty; what use is something like legitimacy?”Clicking his tongue, he shook his head.“It was a long time ago. It’s been decades since the Palace Lord died, and the Sun Palace has already been seized by others, hasn’t it? If some lunatic showed up now and told you to step aside because he’s the Sun Palace Lord’s descendant, would you step aside? They’ll just snort at someone waving a genealogy and harping on legitimacy.”“They will step aside.”“I’ve never once thought you naïve, but today for the first time you look like a child who knows nothing of the world. How did you come to such a simple-minded notion?”Sohwa answered Hae-rak’s mockery calmly.“Those who have seized the Sun Palace call themselves members of the Martial Alliance and claim roots in the Central Plains. Yet the Sun Palace is in the Great Desert, and even they call the palace a branch in the Great Desert, do they not? In the end, the occupiers are people of the Central Plains. In the Outland, Central Plains folk are outsiders. They claimed the palace by setting up a branch under the pretext of protecting Outland comrades from the Blood Cult; if the palace’s rightful owner returns and says he will now fight the Blood Cult directly, then outsiders have no justification to remain, do they?”“Ah, justification.”As if realizing something important, Hae-rak snapped his fingers.“I keep forgetting you’re a Central Plains person. Right. People of the Central Plains prize justification.”Though he teased her, Tang Sohwa did not mind.“Yes. In the Central Plains, justification is vital. Wars rose and fell on it; states stood and vanished by it. Even if Outland culture differs, you too would not wage a war without justification, would you?”“The Great Desert has its justification as well. Weakness is a sin; before others exterminate them, the strong must occupy and take them in.”“……”“What?”Only then did Sohwa’s gaze rise from the paper. When her eyes clouded faintly, Hae-rak let out a small chuckle. Instead of calling it a joke, he corrected himself.“Justification is made by the strong. For the victor, anything can serve as grounds.”That, too, was true.Sohwa dipped her head slightly.“I agree. Justification is made by the strong. Therefore, you will take back the palace.”“Enough. Stop wasting your arm.”Though Hae-rak dropped the banter and spoke seriously, Sohwa did not put down her brush; she resumed copying.“You know the Blood Demon imprisoned Outland bloodlines and experimented on them. Heinous as it was, because of that you gained a body tougher than any martial artist’s, did you not?”Being human, Sohwa felt discomfort saying this—it sounded as if she were granting the Blood Demon a kind of legitimacy.Yet apart from condemning the Blood Demon’s monstrosities, it was true that the surviving Outland bloodlines had obtained a flawless foundation as martial artists.Understanding Hae-rak’s silence, Sohwa did not wait for an answer before she spoke again.“I heard not every Sun Palace bloodline is born with a Scorching Yang Constitution, but you were born with one, were you not?”“Even before the Blood Demon’s derangements, quite a few were born with a Scorching Yang Constitution. So this can hardly be credited to the Blood Demon.”Hae-rak’s tone was cold.Sohwa did not deny it.She simply asked something else.“The one who gave you your name—were they also born with a Scorching Yang Constitution?”“Sohwa, it feels like you’re probing me. Whatever you’re thinking, let’s not talk more on that subject. I’m more soft-hearted than I look; speak of a painful past and I’ll start to cry.”Rather than grow angry at a sensitive topic, Hae-rak made sniffling noises.“Oh, don’t tell me you fancy men who weep? I’ve heard some noble-clan ladies have peculiar tastes in bed, but to think you’d be one of them…”Sohwa’s eyes lifted quietly. Her three-whites gaze was cutting, but Hae-rak, dabbing at the corners of his eyes, teased her to the end.“Glaring won’t do it. I’ve kept this purity safe amid temptations strewn on all sides. I cannot bestow it upon someone with such strange tastes.”Sohwa understood why Hae-rak mocked her as an orthodox young lady. She was a noble-clan maiden to her bones. A curse nearly leapt to her lips at that mad talk, but it snagged in her throat and never became sound.She merely lost her words.After a while, regaining her composure, she spoke again.“When you sought me out at the Hubei Branch under the identity of Min Yeohong—do you remember telling me to prove my usefulness?”“I do.”“Do you also remember asking then whether I could sense another’s inner energy by scent?”Sohwa paused briefly. Then she added in a low voice,“Were you thinking of retrieving someone’s inner energy from the Blood Demon’s body?”The smile vanished from Hae-rak’s face.He did not answer, but Sohwa already knew.Only after reading the Blood Demon’s records had she understood why Hae-rak had come to her.The Blood Cult knew the Blood Demon could absorb others’ inner energy. They believed he could fuse and separate it at will. Since he created secret manuals and even taught a few, they could not help but believe it.Hae-rak was no different.It seemed he wished to recover someone’s inner energy lodged in the Blood Demon’s body.Whether fused or separated, he wanted to confirm its existence within the man.Just as she, despite reports of no survivors, had wanted to return to Tang Manor and verify her family’s bodies with her own eyes.“Your inner energy is perceived by sight. It appears as a white light like sunlight.”She volunteered what Hae-rak had not asked.“But when one is poisoned with Sangong Poison, that light is lost and a lingering scent remains. If I must name it, it’s similar to peony.”And then, slowly, she recited the answer he most likely longed for.“The other day, when the Blood Demon was strangling me, there was an inner energy in his hand that shone white like yours. And there was a peony scent. Since it was near the Shangyang acupoint, it must have been a current that had settled in the index finger. In the Blood Demon’s right hand, at the Shangyang acupoint, there is an inner energy concealed whose grain is the same as yours.”Hae-rak said nothing.She understood his reaction.She could guess at the time he had lived through in the Great Desert—and the kind of death the owner of the inner energy trapped in the Blood Demon’s body had met.Sohwa added nothing more.She had only wanted to tell him, and so she told him.She had told him what he sought; that was enough. There was nothing more to say.Lowering her gaze, Sohwa resumed copying the contents of the secret texts. Only after filling a few more sheets could she go to read a new record.But as she rose from her seat, Hae-rak caught her hand.Sohwa’s gaze dropped. She asked with her eyes why, but the other only met her look without a word. He merely tightened his grip, expressionless, and stared at her. That gaze caught her by the ankle.

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